5 ms·

Could it simply be the speed with which the queries are made, making a bot-blocker suspect a bot? Edit: apologies, meant to reply to OP, not here. To parent, I

Could it simply be the speed with which the queries are made, making a bot-blocker suspect a bot? Edit: apologies, meant to reply to OP, not here. To parent, I already upvote your comment - it's pretty cool, but also scary that we now have conversations about whether we're being surveiled by our government (in the US) as a casual normality. The only difference that appears to remain is that we openly talk about our government surveiling us. I worry they'll attempt put a stop to that too eventually.

asuffield 10y ago
(Tedious disclaimer: my opinion only, not speaking for anybody else. I'm an SRE at Google.) One might describe it as a social botnet: somebody convinced a bunch of people to execute some code on their computer that sent automated search queries. https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/66357?hl=en https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/66357?hl=en "Google's Terms of Service do not allow the sending of automated queries of any sort to our system without express permission in advance from Google." Intentionally using a tool to send automated search queries is pretty clearly prohibited.
- alblue 10y ago
  What about if they were not performing the searches intentionally? What prevents someone paying to serve an advert that does exactly the same thing?
- tmpanon1234act 10y ago
  This whole incident has convinced me to actually use a tool like this, so I'm going to write one and distribute the extension code for free. I promise you won't be able to detect it, so good luck. I think anyone who wants the ability to obscure their search footprint should have it. And if you think otherwise, I'm doubly convinced it's necessary.
  - tamana 10y ago
    TrackMeBot turns 10 years old this summer: http://cs.nyu.edu/trackmenot/ http://cs.nyu.edu/trackmenot/
- tamana 10y ago
  Does that mean any malicious website can shut down any web user's Google account?
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]

asuffield 10y ago

(Tedious disclaimer: my opinion only, not speaking for anybody else. I'm an SRE at Google.) One might describe it as a social botnet: somebody convinced a bunch of people to execute some code on their computer that sent automated search queries. https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/66357?hl=en https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/66357?hl=en "Google's Terms of Service do not allow the sending of automated queries of any sort to our system without express permission in advance from Google." Intentionally using a tool to send automated search queries is pretty clearly prohibited.

alblue 10y ago
What about if they were not performing the searches intentionally? What prevents someone paying to serve an advert that does exactly the same thing?
tmpanon1234act 10y ago
This whole incident has convinced me to actually use a tool like this, so I'm going to write one and distribute the extension code for free. I promise you won't be able to detect it, so good luck. I think anyone who wants the ability to obscure their search footprint should have it. And if you think otherwise, I'm doubly convinced it's necessary.
- tamana 10y ago
  TrackMeBot turns 10 years old this summer: http://cs.nyu.edu/trackmenot/ http://cs.nyu.edu/trackmenot/
tamana 10y ago
Does that mean any malicious website can shut down any web user's Google account?

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]