Microsoft Accidentally Identifies Chrome As "Severe Threat"

[_alter_ego]

If Windows security can't tell the difference between crome an Zeus, how can we expect it to stop viruses?

 

[Zephirius]

It turns out that Chrome was being removed from PCs running on the Windows platform are identifying Chrome as a variant of the infamous Zeus ("Zbot") family of viruses.

Holy shiznit, guys. I wasn't going to say anything, but things like this have been popping up in most of the news posts I've read on this site (and, oddly enough, occasionally on RPS as well) lately. I know you're in a hurry to publish more but geez, get a good editor or something.

 

[M4t3us]

Ah Google's spyw-... "data collecting service" has finally been discovered! XD

 

[Virmire]

Perhaps they've realized the swiftly decreasing difference between Google and Skynet?

 

[hexFrank202]

Program jealousy. No, not the people at Microsoft trying to fight Google, the Microsoft Virus Protection software itself saw that little Chrome program, sitting all smug-like at the top of every start menu; every program wishes they could be as efficient, comfortable and seamlessly customizable as that. And so, in an embarrassing fit of rage, it tried to get it removed.

 

[Coffinshaker]

good for you windows! I don't like chrome, don't want it, and half the updates from Adobe and other sources automatically install it without consent. as far as I'm concerned, Chrome IS malware!

 

[Th37thTrump3t]

I have had the hamster responsible... dealt with. ALL COMMENTING MAY NOW RESUME ON THE NEWSING

1,000,001 thanks to you oh mighty server admin. ALL PRAISE!

OT: Ass kissing aside, this is just funny as hell. I could just see Bill Gates sitting in his completely gold covered office with the biggest smirk on his face thinking "We got those google fuckers now." and then realizing "Oh shit! This actually pissed a bunch of people off... Quick, patch it before we lose more money because Bing sucks ass!"

 

[JamesStone]

Hmm... This wouldn't have anything to do with Microsoft suffering millions of dollars in losses from their competing Bing search engine, would it? I can see it now:

Microsoft Exec: "Team, I want you to program MSE to get Google Chrome off people's computers... and make it look like an accident."

Programmer: "But sir, isn't that an extremely unethical business practice?"

Microsoft Exec: "Who cares? Just reprogram MSE to kill Chrome. If it works, we'll make Bing a huge success overnight. If people get mad, we'll just patch MSE back to the way it was and no one will ever know."

Programmer: "Sir, this plan is both highly unethical and unbelievably stupid. It's not right, and I won't do it."

Microsoft Exec: "I understand completely, Johnson. That's why I'm planning to give out special awards to all Microsoft employees who value their personal integrity over making lots of money. The awards are printed on beautiful pink paper."

Programmer: "I'll get right on it."

Okay, okay; I'm done beating up on Microsoft... for now.

I only have one thing to say:

LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL.

Really good stuff. Keep it going.

OT: At least they patch it up quickly. I bet that if it was on purpose, they could keep it going for a lot of time, and probably conquer the world.
As I said in other threads, I have a very fertile imagination.

 

[Th37thTrump3t]

Happens in the industry. Not as vile a sin as the time McAfee [http://www.eweekeurope.co.uk/news/mcafee-update-breaks-windows-xp-systems-6594] decided the Windows service host (a critical part of Windows) was a threat and deleted that! When three BSODs-on-boot came in to my shop in as many hours, I got rather suspicious!

Actually... I think that happened to me once. How else would one lose a win32.sys registry file when one is 14 years old and -NOT- doing clicky click in the registers?

It's possible. My experiences with antivirus programs has made me suspicious of setting them so they autokill suspicious objects. With daily updates it's obvious most of them are not tested on anything but a few token systems before release.

One word, Avast.

 

[Adam28]

lol. "accidentally".

Still it was only 3000, very small considering the actual chrome user base.

 

[Jerusalem]

The reason why only 3000 users were affected is that it's the size of the group that uses both chrome and microsoft antivirus at the same time. That's like installing gentoo, and using explorer through wine.

 

[Digitaldreamer7]

Chrome is awesome, I've never liked firefox or opera. I didn't have the issue so meh. This wasn't intentional. It probably had something to do with a specific extension they were using that had a specific piece of code it identified as a threat. If it were the browser itself that number probably would have been extremely higher.

 

[Bloodstain]

Good thing I use Opera.

 

[evilneko]

"Severe Threat" ...hmm, maybe to IE, but not to any other decent browser.

 

[Vhite]

Im really not surprised that google software is being seen as spyware.

 

[WarpZone]

Does nobody remember the days when the latest patch for Netscape or Microsoft Internet Explorer would each cause the other program to fail? This is nothing new. Only our response to it as consumers has changed.

 

[grigjd3]

These things happen.