Leafless Posted February 12, 2007 Report Share Posted February 12, 2007 In the active users list, I have noticed quite frequently Google.com appears as an active user but does not exist as a member. Who is Google.com? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
M.Dancer Posted February 12, 2007 Report Share Posted February 12, 2007 Google.com is a service that posters, not wishing to look like uninformed yahoos, use regularly. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charles Anthony Posted February 12, 2007 Report Share Posted February 12, 2007 It is a search spider or a robot. It is an automated function of the Google engine. Other search engines (and spammers for that matter) do the same. What the Google engine is doing is it searches out the internet and examines the text. It is a program which is analogous to loading up websites and activating the various links and indexing keywords. The Google engine updates its database routinely. Technically, if somebody does a specific search in Google for "Canadian Politics" there is a chance that they will see a thread from this forum. In fact, that is how I first found this forum. [Although, I wish I could remember what my exact search was.... probably "how to trash socialists" or something like that.] I guess you are all thinking now that Google is such a wonderful thing, right? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leafless Posted February 13, 2007 Author Report Share Posted February 13, 2007 I don't know what you say is a accurate if you consider google itself could be a spy on this site or interested on someone on this site. http://searchenginewatch.com/showPage.html?page=2175251 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
theloniusfleabag Posted February 13, 2007 Report Share Posted February 13, 2007 Dear Leafless, consider google itself could be a spy on this site or interested on someone on this site.Most anything is possible. I would like to think that whenever google appears here, it is likely some world leader or other who is interested in what I had to say on the matter . Then, after thinking it through, my wishes sound like 'delusional paranoia coupled with a messiah complex'. Then again, there is probably a little bit of that in all of us. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leafless Posted February 13, 2007 Author Report Share Posted February 13, 2007 Dear Leafless,consider google itself could be a spy on this site or interested on someone on this site.Most anything is possible. I would like to think that whenever google appears here, it is likely some world leader or other who is interested in what I had to say on the matter . Then, after thinking it through, my wishes sound like 'delusional paranoia coupled with a messiah complex'. Then again, there is probably a little bit of that in all of us. Ask an intelligent question and get a dumb answer, as to suggest "delusional parania coupled with the massiah complex" inflicts all of us, including you. The point is, this a privacy issue. Google.com is not a member of this site yet appears in the active users list. How did it get there? As far as that goes Google.com could be working for a government or whoever, to pry or search out personal information, something it certainly has the resources to do. I don't know about you , but I find Google.com as an unauthorized member on this site, a potential threat or direct threat to personal privacy, especially on a political site. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charles Anthony Posted February 13, 2007 Report Share Posted February 13, 2007 Google.com is not a member of this site yet appears in the active users list. How did it get there?It got there as a guest viewer. On a technical standpoint, "Google.com" is only able to see or collect information that guests can see or collect. The reason why it appears as "Google.com" and not as "guest" is because the Google program sends a self-identifying signal to the website. Therefore, the forum software is able to identify that the Google.com robot is currently loading the website. As far as that goes Google.com could be working for a government or whoever, to pry or search out personal information, something it certainly has the resources to do.You could be right. However, your vulnerability would still exist with any guest or spammer or other search engine or any other nefarious computer user. I don't know about you , but I find Google.com as an unauthorized member on this site, a potential threat or direct threat to personal privacy, especially on a political site.The take-home message is that NOBODY can stop "Google.com" from surfing or searching the website because it uses the same capabilities as a real-live person who is surfing the web. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Slavik44 Posted February 13, 2007 Report Share Posted February 13, 2007 The take-home message is that NOBODY can stop "Google.com" from surfing or searching the website because it uses the same capabilities as a real-live person who is surfing the web. Well actually if it was that big of deal you could stop google.com...I am fairly sure that you can mask posts from guests, but is it really that big of deal? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leafless Posted February 14, 2007 Author Report Share Posted February 14, 2007 The take-home message is that NOBODY can stop "Google.com" from surfing or searching the website because it uses the same capabilities as a real-live person who is surfing the web. Well actually if it was that big of deal you could stop google.com...I am fairly sure that you can mask posts from guests, but is it really that big of deal? This is what is troublesome. Just how significant is 'Google.com' or considering a possible definite purpose, as in comparison to a spammer or regular nobody hack? No one will ever know except for the fact 'Google.com' is here and could be doing anything. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
geoffrey Posted February 14, 2007 Report Share Posted February 14, 2007 Nameless guests are here constantly too. The only means possible of protecting everything you say is to simply not say it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Riverwind Posted February 14, 2007 Report Share Posted February 14, 2007 The take-home message is that NOBODY can stop "Google.com" from surfing or searching the website because it uses the same capabilities as a real-live person who is surfing the web.That is not quite true. I have a publicly available website which I would like to get google and msn to index but the scripting on the page screws up their bots. If programming errors can render a site invisible then it should be easy to do it deliberately. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charles Anthony Posted February 14, 2007 Report Share Posted February 14, 2007 Just how significant is 'Google.com' or considering a possible definite purpose, as in comparison to a spammer or regular nobody hack?I do not understand this question. Please rephrase it. No one will ever know except for the fact 'Google.com' is here and could be doing anything.If you fear that the Google company has devised a secret way to hack into websites and find confidential information, that is technically possible. However, trouble-making hackers and spammers attempt to do the very same thing all of the time. Thus, whatever security holes the Google company exploits will likely be discovered by others too. It would be dificult to keep those exploits secret. I have a publicly available website which I would like to get google and msn to index but the scripting on the page screws up their bots. If programming errors can render a site invisible then it should be easy to do it deliberately.I may be misunderstanding you but it sounds like you are confusing different things. First, if a search engine does not index a site, you can not conclude that the site is invisible to the search engine or that the site was not spidered by the engine's robot. The search engine may have simply judged the site is not worthy enough to be indexed relative to other sites on the web. Second, you can not assume what is or is not in a search engine's index. Chances are that the search engines store much more than they let on. Third, if a human being can load up a website, the search engines can load it. Fourth, what type of scripting are you talking about? what type of "errors" do you mean? do you mean poorly constructed code/markup? or do you mean deliberately poor code to confuse the robots? CAVEAT: if the information in the website is contained in multimedia or proprietary software file formats, you can not expect the engines to extract it all. For example, a website on Money and Banking might have a vast wealth of magnificent information contained in hours and hours of videos. The only way of learning such illuminating wisdom is by watching and listening to the videos. Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on how you look at it), the search engines will not be able to classify or rank the quality of information in the videos. Conversely, if text transcripts of all of these videos were included on the site, the search engine would be able to rank the site more appropriately -- for better or for worse. The same problem may occur with websites that are foolishly cluttered with amateur quality Flash or PDF files. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Riverwind Posted February 14, 2007 Report Share Posted February 14, 2007 - Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Forum Admin Greg Posted February 15, 2007 Forum Admin Report Share Posted February 15, 2007 In the active users list, I have noticed quite frequently Google.com appears as an active user but does not exist. The forum software recognizes that the Google spider is indexing the forums contents, and it shows up as a active member. This is just a function of the forum software and Google isn't doing anything malicious. You might also see a few other search engine spiders (and forum search spiders) in that field too. The best way to distinguish between an actual member and a spider is an actual member has a link to their profile, spiders do not. The point is, this a privacy issue.Google.com is not a member of this site yet appears in the active users list. How did it get there? It's not really a privacy issue, as I actively encourage the Google spider to index the site regularly. Anything written on the Internet has the potential to find its way into the Google database. I won't go into specifics, but Google provides a number of services that webmasters can use to maximize the indexing rate and depth. The Google spider has no more access to the board than someone viewing it anonymously. It is just that this board provides a visual indication that the Google spider is actually indexing the site. As far as that goes Google.com could be working for a government or whoever, to pry or search out personal information, something it certainly has the resources to do. They could be, but I HIGHLY doubt it. What would be the incentive for Google to spy on foreign or domestic citizens? I imagine they're more concerned with their stock price than with a governments desire to peek into the search habits of average citizens. I don't know about you , but I find Google.com as an unauthorized member on this site, a potential threat or direct threat to personal privacy, especially on a political site. They're not an unauthorized member on this site. The take-home message is that NOBODY can stop "Google.com" from surfing or searching the website because it uses the same capabilities as a real-live person who is surfing the web. That isn't exactly true. I could ask Google NOT to index/access the site via a Robots.txt file on the server. The Robot.txt file would instruct the Google spider to NOT index the domain, mapleleafweb.com (or I could even specify not to index the forums). However, I'm not willing to do this as Google provides a great deal of traffic to these forums and to Maple Leaf Web. I could also block the IP address of Google (or anyone else for that matter) through a few lines in a .htaccess file. However, again, this isn't something I'm willing to do. I am fairly sure that you can mask posts from guests, but is it really that big of deal? This forum software has this capability too, however, i prefer open access to everyone. No one will ever know except for the fact 'Google.com' is here and could be doing anything. The only thing Google is going is indexing the website. Nothing more, nothing less... That is not quite true. I have a publicly available website which I would like to get google and msn to index but the scripting on the page screws up their bots. If programming errors can render a site invisible then it should be easy to do it deliberately. PM me and I can help you with this. The spiders for Google, MSN, Yahoo, etc, have become pretty sophisticated now, and they can index almost any website. However, there are definitely things you can do to improve the index depth and rate. PM me and I can take a look at your site and help you improve it. If you fear that the Google company has devised a secret way to hack into websites and find confidential information, that is technically possible. However, trouble-making hackers and spammers attempt to do the very same thing all of the time. Thus, whatever security holes the Google company exploits will likely be discovered by others too. It would be dificult to keep those exploits secret. Again, what would be the point of Google compromising someone's website? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Forum Admin Greg Posted February 15, 2007 Forum Admin Report Share Posted February 15, 2007 P.S. It's kinda nice to be able to openly discuss these issues, as I've got a fair amount of experience in these areas. So if anyone has any other questions and or comments, please share them. I avoid discussing politics - for obvious reasons - in the forums, so I'm tickled when there are topics like this one that I can join in and share my thoughts, Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leafless Posted February 15, 2007 Author Report Share Posted February 15, 2007 Thanks Greg and all others for the information. I suppose this clears things up about 'Google.com' on this site. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
August1991 Posted February 16, 2007 Report Share Posted February 16, 2007 I don't know about you , but I find Google.com as an unauthorized member on this site, a potential threat or direct threat to personal privacy, especially on a political site.WTF?This is a public forum. Anyone with access to the Internet can read any comment written here. It's like worrying about your privacy while running down a main street stark naked. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jdobbin Posted February 16, 2007 Report Share Posted February 16, 2007 I'd like to come forward and admit that I am Google.com. I've had forum participants, moderators and owners fooled for some time. I can now say that I have indexed all of the posts and know where each and everyone of you lives. And this is my conclusion: Move out of your parent's basement! Thank you for your time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jdobbin Posted February 16, 2007 Report Share Posted February 16, 2007 It's like worrying about your privacy while running down a main street stark naked. I don't know about you but when I run down the street naked, I cover the dangly bits with my hands. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leafless Posted February 16, 2007 Author Report Share Posted February 16, 2007 I don't know about you , but I find Google.com as an unauthorized member on this site, a potential threat or direct threat to personal privacy, especially on a political site.WTF?This is a public forum. Anyone with access to the Internet can read any comment written here. It's like worrying about your privacy while running down a main street stark naked. Don't be a ding! The question was concerning Google.com having member status but was not registered as a member. BTW- I PERSONALLY have NO FEAR concerning a potential or direct threat concerning personal privacy as I SURF NAKED, got nothing to hide. My computer is bare bones. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
geoffrey Posted February 17, 2007 Report Share Posted February 17, 2007 If you were ever concerned, there was another non-member member on tonight: archive.org Apparently this site maintains enourmous amount of internet records, allows you to go back in time and view websites as they appeared on whatever date you wish. http://img144.imageshack.us/img144/9638/mapleleafbc5.jpg Not that I'm really concerned, I just love the conspiracies on occasion. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.