Google Tags Harmful Websites “Repeat Offenders” To Make Browsing Safer

Google issued a notification on its security blog Tuesday saying it will start tagging harmful sites which have been issued previous warnings as “repeat offenders” and they will continue to appear in search results with security warnings till they are no longer harmful.

Once the tag is put on a website, its webmaster will be unable request any reviews to Google's Search Console for 30 days, the minimum period for which the warning will remain on the website's Google search listing. The webmaster will also be notified via email on their registered email address once a website has been determined to be a repeat offender by Google.

“Over time, we’ve observed that a small number of websites will cease harming users for long enough to have the warnings removed, and will then revert to harmful activity,” Google’s blog post states.

Staring Nov. 8, sites violating Google’s malware, unwanted software, phishing and social engineering policies will start showing warnings. The verification process to have the tag removed can be requested by webmasters using the Search Console.

Hacked websites will not be classified as repeat offenders, and only those that switch between compliant and non-compliant behavior will have the tag.