The Security Mentor

When you search for something on the web you get a list of matches and you also get a list of paid ads from companies that put up money to get listed whenever someone typed in your particular search. If you use Google, those are the ads off to the right.

Sometimes these companies are crooked. Sometimes they're more likely to be crooked than the ones who show up in the unpaid search results. Sometimes they try to put malicious software onto your computer.

Siteadvisor just tested how many advertised websites install malware or are scams. It's kind of interesting that their results varied from one search engine to the next. MSN turns down business from crooked advertsers better than the others: only 3% of their paid search results were toxic. On the other hand that's a percentage that guarantees you'll run into something dangerous if you're reasonably active on the web.

What's more interesting is the search terms they used to run their tests. The articles says

The most dangerous keywords include "free screensavers," "bearshare," "kazaa," "download music" and "free games."

If it hurts when you search for a notorious piece of spyware, well, as the doctor said, "Stop doing that".