399881 - Google Ad in GMAIL claims to offer downloads of "Firefox4.0"

Status: RESOLVED FIXED

(Marketing :: Trademark Violations, task)

Description

[Gregory Maxwell]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686 (x86_64); en-US; rv:1.8.0.10) Gecko/20070510 Fedora/1.5.0.10-6.fc6 Firefox/1.5.0.10
Build Identifier: 

I just saw an advert in gmail: "Firefox4.0 Free Download - www.browsesafeonline.com - Download Firefox4.0 Free, Safe and Q -  Sponsored Link"

Google should probably be reminded that firefox is a trademark... normally they don't allow trademarked words in ads.

Reproducible: Sometimes

Steps to Reproduce:
1. Run gmail
2. Click around a lot
3. Wait for ad to show up
Actual Results:  
Fake ad shows up.

Expected Results:  
Only ads for Real Firefox(tm) should show up.

Comment 1

[Mister McGregor]

I have seen this.

Comment 2

[Ryan Hickman]

I have as well, just unsure of the validity of this being a Trademark Violation. This might also be why I'm not a lawyer.

Comment 3

[Tyler Downer [He/Him]]

Funny that it is saying FF4, when there is not even a dev release of that yet. I am wondering if it will have to be with www.browsesafeonline.com that the issue is with, not as much Google themselves. I agree they should not allow that, but the advertiser should be the one we go after.

Comment 4

[Liz Compton [:liz]]

This bug fell through the cracks and I was just made aware of it. We have worked with Google to stop the display of non-Mozilla Firefox ads, so that problem has since been resolved. When I tried to go to this site I got the message "This web site at www.browsesafeonline.com has been reported as an attack site and has been blocked based on your security preferences." I didn't want to risk going to the site to see if it still offers a presumably unauthorized version of Firefox. If someone else would like to check, and confirm that the product offered is distributing malware, please do so and report back.

Comment 5

[Ryan Hickman]

Well, the "Why was this page blocked?" link - http://safebrowsing.clients.google.com/safebrowsing/diagnostic?client=Firefox&hl=en-US&site=http://www.browsesafeonline.com/ - explains it pretty well.

Visiting that site actually shows FF 2. I can't access any links on the site, possibly due to AdBlock, Windows Security Essentials and OpenDNS.

Comment 6

[Kevin Brosnan]

Attachment: Screenshot of the page

The page contains no images or links to Firefox builds. It looks like the page was created to take advantage of the Google campaign that payed a dollar for each new Firefox install.

Comment 7

[Liz Compton [:liz]]

Since people are no longer directed to this site by Google ads and there is no malware being distributed, I don't think it's a priority to pursue. Anyone feel differently?

Comment 8

[Ryan Hickman]

No ma'am. The issue has definitely taken care of itself. Though who knows how many people were infected because of the allowed usage of the Firefox trademark.