Microsoft stands on Google's toes by curb-stomping Chrome

by Steven Mostyn - Oct 4 2011, 09:35

There’s likely an air of muffled annoyance brewing between Microsoft and Google this morning after the Redmond-based software behemoth accidentally curb-stomped the search titan’s Chrome browser.

The case of somewhat violent mistaken identity reared up when Microsoft’s antivirus platform incorrectly isolated Google’s web browser as a component connected to the nefarious ZeuS Trojan (a.k.a. Zbot).

And, as ZeuS is well known in security circles as a piece of particularly nasty malware capable of stealing sensitive data from victims (i.e., bank account details), it’s perhaps no surprise Microsoft clamped down so swiftly.

However, Redmond loosened its security shackles a matter of hours later when it was discovered that Chrome had been targeted due to a faulty signature update issued to both Microsoft Security Essentials and Microsoft Forefront. Oops.

“We released an update signature (1.113.672.0) at 9:57 a.m. PDT,” outlined a Microsoft spokesperson in an official statement. “But approximately 3,000 customers were impacted.”

“Affected customers should manually update Microsoft Security Essentials (MSE) with the latest signatures,” the company added. “To do this, simply launch MSE, go to the update tab and click the Update button, and then reinstall Google Chrome.”

Google has since said it will also release an update to help automatically rectify any content damage done by the false positive.

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