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Google Keeps Safe With Log Data
David Utter
Staff Writer
2008-03-14
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The voluminous log files Google retains on the activities of its users actually helps the search company combat threats.
 | | Google Keeps Safe With Log Data |  |
Google's data retention policies have been the subject of some debate, ever since the Bush Administration made a grab for search engine logs to support a court case in Pennsylvania. For US Attorney General Alberto Gonzales' Justice Department filed suit against Google when it refused to comply with the federal subpoena.
Other search engines had readily and quietly complied without complaint, leaving Google looking like a hero for standing up to the Administration's bullying tactics. That positive perception faded over time, especially when the company made its bid for DoubleClick, a merger that puts a majority of Internet users' activity at Google's fingertips.
Calls for Google to voluntarily stop retaining log data met with resistance. Google fully understands the value of information, but finally agreed to an 18-month retention period after which it would anonymize log data.
Google justified keeping this data in a post on the official Google blog. They analyze log data for search results that could take people to malware or other online threats, as in this example:
One good example is the Santy search worm, which first appeared in late 2004. Santy used combinations of search terms on Google to identify and then infect vulnerable web servers. Once a web server was infected, it became part of a botnet and started searching Google for more vulnerable servers. Spreading in this way, Santy quickly infected thousands and thousands of web servers across the Internet.
As soon as Google recognized the attack, we began developing a series of tools to automatically generate "regular expressions" that could identify potential Santy queries and then block them from accessing Google.com or flag them for further attention.
With its log data, Google could refine its security to deal with the worm's threat. We wonder if Google still needs that over three year old log information at all, now that they have regular expressions in place to stop Santy.
About the Author:
David Utter is a business and technology writer for SecurityProNews and WebProNews.
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