There was post early today (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13463263) where the same issue was happening, but the search was for youtube. The hoax site looked just like you are describing. Interestingly, I am no longer seeing any ads on my google searches.
I'd add, the page source has some Cyrillic script in it, and it also has some embedded base64 encoded media, one of which doesn't appear to decode into anything properly. Maybe they are trying some undisclosed exploit?
If you wanna check and see if Google Ads are live, search "windows support". There's always scam vendors in the ads there, and Google never does anything about them. Part of their business model to push Chromebooks. :)
As the case is, "windows support" still has three malicious ads up top, but the YouTube ad from earlier is gone, and it looks like they fixed the Amazon one, AFAICT.
Yeah, the ads for windows support show up, however they all actually link to where the add says they do. In the case of the youtube and amazon ones today, the add link showed amazon.com and youtube.com respectively, but didn't go to either.
This has been going on for a week, but the thing that hits the top of HN is that they updated Google Voice. Serious security issues need not apply to front page.
I've pinged a couple security experts directly, nobody's responded on the issue. I told a tech news site about it. Waiting for someone to recognize that Google Ads has a major security problem right now.
I agree with your take. This should absolutely be taken more seriously. At the very least this site is a scam site, and it seems possible that it is even more nefarious. Google ads are supposed to be very credible, unlike the Wild West of some ad networks.
I'd contest the claim that "Google ads are very credible", they ship a lot of malware. But the key point is that that green URL bar NEEDS to be accurate. If it says http://www.amazon.com in the green text next to the Ad marker, it absolutely had better go to amazon.com.
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[ 1.7 ms ] story [ 42.4 ms ] threadthe link looks like:
The search looks legit and everything though, even shows the url as www.amazon.com
As the case is, "windows support" still has three malicious ads up top, but the YouTube ad from earlier is gone, and it looks like they fixed the Amazon one, AFAICT.
I've pinged a couple security experts directly, nobody's responded on the issue. I told a tech news site about it. Waiting for someone to recognize that Google Ads has a major security problem right now.
My submission from a week ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13413399