Bug Shows Google Corporate Site in Chinese, Raises False Alarm

Posted 03/24/2010 at 6:11pm | by Pulkit Chandna

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It was a cyber attack that sparked the current row between Google and the Chinese administration, leading Google to redirect all searches coming from China to its uncensored Hong Kong-based site. And the day began with the Guardian breaking the news of what appeared to be a fresh cyber attack against Google. The internet giant's corporate information sites were appearing in Chinese.

Even though a Google search for the term “Google executives” returned an English-language page at the very top of the search results, clicking on the link automatically redirected the user to a company page with all information in Chinese.  The report also noted that the main corporate page “was also in Chinese and further directing users from there to the new non-censored Chinese version of Google.” With the inexplicable redirects coming straight after Google's exit from China, a cyber attack appeared to offer the best possible explaination.

However, Google later clarified that the redirects were a result of a bug and not some kind of a hack. "This is not a hack but rather a bug affecting the language displayed to some users, and we are working to fix it soon," a Google spokesperson said in a statement to CNET.

Image Credit: Cnet