Strange Google icons

[hurlimann]

Getting some very stange icons from Google.com but not on Google.co.uk.

Is this some sort of hack going on?

http://www.google.com/images/res1.gif

[andreasfriedrich]

No. Google just uses several images to display their logo.

[PanUK]

There was the flag of Argentina covering the lower part of the second "g" when I saw it, but there has also been a womans upper half covering the upper part of the second "g".

Hack job?

[PanUK]

By the way, I'm seeing this on google.co.uk but not on google.com

[hurlimann]

we are also getting [google.com...] instead of the Gooooooogle graphic at the bottom.

All very strange and as it results in a total mess, and this has been posted about before, Googleguy may like to alert whoever as I can't belive they want woman bodies and cuban and Argentinan flags for navigation.

[c3oc3o]

Can any of you seeing anything strange take a screenshot of it instead of linking to the files, which apparently look perfectly normal to everyone not in the UK?

[PanUK]

Will these do.....

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/fetchfido2/bits_dump/google_icons/Image1.jpg
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/fetchfido2/bits_dump/google_icons/Image2.jpg
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/fetchfido2/bits_dump/google_icons/Image3.jpg

[hurlimann]

LOL: Havn't seen these ones. I'm surprised Google aren't onto this. It was first posted about here around 10 days ago.

[GoogleGuy]

We're checking it out now. For the users who have seen this, please write to [e-mail] with a subject line like "google logo has flags" and tell
us:
- what ISP are your using?
- do you use any proxy or proxying product?
- if you're willing, tell us your IP address. If you're very helpful + tech savvy, a traceroute to Google would be handy too.
- basic machine info (operating system and browser version, etc.)

That'll help us nail down what's causing this. Seems like it's fairly isolated so far, so any first-hand report would help!

Thanks,
GoogleGuy

[hurlimann]

Will do:
NFFC spotted it appears to affect only ISP's that use the Inktomi caching system.
It also appears to be a UK only problem but is occuring on either or .com or .co.uk

[PanUK]

Tracroute on it's way....

Different images today.
[homepage.ntlworld.com...]
[homepage.ntlworld.com...]

Thanks for looking at the problem.

[PanUK]

My google.co.uk has finally become flagless!

Miss the little b*****s already.

[brotherhood of LAN]

Someone else mentioned this a few days ago in here....GG you might want to use the site search ;)

[allybongo]

I was still getting them last night. I was on an imac using ie5 and on google.co.uk through ntl broadband.

[hurlimann]

Still getting them: Now I get little men instead of the oooooooo's.

[PanUK]

Arrrgh they're back !

For the record....
IE6.0, Netscape6.2, NTL broadband,

[chris_f]

Mine's been screwing up for days.

PanUK, I noticed you go through NTL. So do I. Is this the same for us all?

Chris.

[aspdaddy]

Just noticed it for the first time, at the bottom of the search results, two flags wheer the next should be. I use NTL Broadband too.

[PanUK]

Hi Chris,

The answer is no, I was over at my uncles yesterday fixing his computer(mega virus infection), he is on AOL but I looked on IE at Google and he had a flag. It bugs me though I think I was looking at "Google.com" not "Google.co.uk".

[NFFC]

>he is on AOL

They use Inktomi's caching software, as do NTL.

Strike anybody as a little strange that this is only affecting Google? ;)

[chris_f]

>he is on AOL

They use Inktomi's caching software, as do NTL.

BINGO. Your right NTL do use Ink's caching software. I've just dialed in using a modem and everything is ok. Back to NTL broadband and their back.

Next question, is it an accident??? or is my paranoia setting in.;)

I've just rung a friend at NTL and he is tring to get clearance to clear the cache of any GG sites.

Chris.

[chowcat]

I first experienced this about 9 days ago... using an aol dial up from london..

[webmasterworld.com...]

Seemed to be resolved here.....

[webmasterworld.com...]

[chowcat]

In fact, one thing I did notice happen, very quickly before the problems begin to start again is this.....

If I type www.google.com into the address bar, a download window popped up very briefly, and then disapeared. This happened twice. Then I'd clear my cache and go back to google and it would be ok. Until that download window appeared again, randomly.

I think this is when my machine downloaded other images and replaced [google.com...] as well as other google images in my cache, with other images.

Hope this throws some light on it.

[aspdaddy]

That last post is making me nervous:(
Could it be a virus ?

[DaveN]

CHOWCAT

Do you have any file sharing programs running?

Daven

[chowcat]

no file sharing programs at all... at home, which is the only place I have experienced the problems.

[Chris_R]

Looks like a new cindy might be the most downloaded woman on the Internet

The second link panuk posted appears to be Cindy from here (but a little squished):

Compare

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/fetchfido2/bits_dump/google_icons/Image2.jpg

with

http://www.google.com/corporate/execs.html

[chris_f]

Any news GoogleGuy? I sent [e-mail] an email as you suggest with loads (and I'm [big]LOADS[/big] of info including trace routes. Is it possible to give us an update?

Chris.

p.s. if it is, as suspected, a problem with caching software you could overcome it by renaming you images. I don't know how much coding this would be though.

[mistah]

I got a funny download message about a week ago.

[GoogleGuy]

Hi all, just wanted to post an update. Very few people have reported this problem, and as far as I know they were all customers of a particular ISP. We believe that this ISP's caching proxy got very confused for a while.

We've been in contact with the ISP and asked them to flush their proxy, so hopefully this issue has been fixed. If you still see this happening, please write to [e-mail] with your ISP and any info like proxies/IPs/traceroutes.

But hopefully this is a solved issue. The problem wasn't at Google, but we appreciate users letting us know about it so we could contact the ISP in question. :)