Google often gives me error messages like the one below:
(click on the image for full view)
We’re sorry…
… but your query looks similar to automated requests from a computer virus or spyware application. To protect our users, we can’t process your request right now.
We’ll restore your access as quickly as possible, so try again soon. In the meantime, if you suspect that your computer or network has been infected, you might want to run a virus checker or spyware remover to make sure that your systems are free of viruses and other spurious software.
We apologize for the inconvenience, and hope we’ll see you again on Google.
Sometimes it happens when I’m combining Google’s URL parameters in strange ways. Lately it has been happening for no apparent reason.
I wasn’t logged into Google and my cookies had been recently cleared. I’m running Linux so I doubt it’s a virus or spyware…
Hi Josh.
I got exactly that error fairly recently. I am running firefox on a mac so that rules out the linux option.
It was happening to me when I changed my settings from viewing only 10 items to 100 items per page..
Hi Duncan,
I’m in Firefox on Linux so I doubt it’s spyware. I think Google tries to block bots from their site based on unusual combinations of parameters. Sometimes there is a false alarm and they flag your IP.
After I wrote this blog post there was a period of time where I couldn’t search Google without entering a CAPTCHA phrase—even after clearing my cookies.
This is usually caused by sending too many requests to Google in a short period of time.
I’ve had it happen when I’m checking ranking for lots of keywords at once with a script, but I have also had it happen from just manually searching.
The error usually only lasts for a short while.