posted by admin on February 3, 2009 01:16 AM

Were you one of the Googlers worried you were infecting your computer with viruses on Saturday morning?

For about an hour on Saturday, each and every Google search resulted in a warning that "this site may harm your computer." What happened, according to a Google statement, is due to - human error. Google works with a nonprofit that tracks the sites that install malicious software on visiting computers. On Saturday, someone accidentally checked the input value that applied to ALL URLs - ouch!

The term "human error" in situations like these is kind of amusing. It's framed almost as a good thing ("don't worry - there's nothing wrong with our software. Bob just pushed the wrong button!), but the reality is that human error can be just as harmful as systemic errors - especially because you can usually weed out the systemic errors by fixing the code (or, for you Office Space fans out there, "fixing the glitch").

There's often no such quick fix for human error.

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