Google News Algorithm: A hacked Telangana government website managed to deceive and spam Google News’ algorithm today, November 8, 2024, according to the report by ‘The Hindu’. Hackers apparently targeted a weakness in the Hyderabad Metropolitan Water Supply and Sewerage Board’s (HMWSSB) official website, hyderabadwater.gov.in. The HMWSSB website serves Hyderabad residents to settle their water bills digitally.
The HMWSSB official website displays a maintenance notice, reading, “Coming Back Soon. This site is currently down for maintenance.”
Although the exact timing of the hack remains unknown, suspicious promotional links for betting, online rummy, and casinos started appearing on Google News’ technology section earlier today. Google News’ technology section displayed suspicious links, mostly from HMWSSB, redirecting users to (betwww20.com), an online betting platform.
Notably, Google restricts the promotion of gambling-related content, including online casinos, sports betting, lotteries, and more.
This type of cyberattack involves exploiting weaknesses in a website’s database by injecting malicious SQL (Structured Query Language) code, manipulating its query system. The incident exposes vulnerabilities in HMWSSB’s website and Google News’ algorithm, potentially stemming from a Structured Query Language Injection (SQLi) attack, a prevalent hacking method.
This type of cyberattack is done when a hacker takes advantage of vulnerabilities in a website’s database query system by injecting harmful SQL code into web forms, URL parameters, or other input fields. This occurs when the website doesn’t properly validate or sanitize user input before incorporating it into SQL queries.
