Hackers hide dangerous fake AI downloads behind Google ads

You search Google for Claude, the popular AI assistant, and spot a sponsored result. The link points to Bing, Microsoft's search engine. Nothing immediately screams scam. However, that click could send you through several websites before landing on a convincing fake Claude download page designed to trick you into running a dangerous command on your Mac.

Security researchers at Push Security uncovered a clever attack that uses legitimate search engine links to hide a malicious installer. The technique, which researchers jokingly call "Adception," takes advantage of how Google ads and Bing redirects work. Even more concerning, the fake installer shows one command on the screen while secretly copying another. Here's how the scam works and what you should know before downloading AI software.

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The attack begins with a Google search for "Claude Mac." According to Push Security, researchers discovered a sponsored search result that displayed bing.com as its destination. That address might seem reassuring because Bing belongs to Microsoft. However, clicking the advertisement sends users through a series of redirects. First, Google's advertising system processes the click. Next, Bing's legitimate click-tracking service forwards the browser to a compromised WordPress website belonging to a South American retailer. Finally, that website sends the visitor to a fake Claude download page.

The final website, claude-desk-code[.]com, imitates the real Claude download experience. It presents what appears to be a legitimate macOS installation option. By the time someone reaches the page, they may have little reason to suspect the journey began with a malicious advertisement. Researchers say the attackers deliberately used a real Bing search result for a compromised website. This allowed the attackers to display Bing's legitimate domain in the Google advertisement while using Bing's click-tracking redirect to send visitors toward the malicious destination.

The scammers added another layer of deception to make their operation harder to detect. The compromised retailer's website checks whether visitors arrived through Bing and whether their browsers send certain information. Meanwhile, the fake Claude website checks whether visitors came from Google or Bing. Someone who visits the malicious website directly may see a 404 error page instead of the fake installer. That behavior can make it harder for security scanners to investigate the attack because they may never encounter the page that victims actually see.

Push Security calls this technique cloaking. Attackers use it to control who reaches their malicious content while showing something harmless to other visitors. In this case, the researchers observed two separate checks designed to protect the attack from unwanted attention. The result is a carefully constructed path that makes a dangerous destination appear more trustworthy than it really