[SOLVED] Can you get infected by previewing an image on Google Image?

Ztron5

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May 4, 2020
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Hi, everyone! I hope you are all well!

I have a silly question, but I'm paranoid because I have been screwed by viruses/malware before. I apologize.

My antivirus (Avast) sometimes abort connections when I click on images on Google Search (I use Google Chrome with Avast and Malwarebytes extensions too, to increase my protection).

I never go to the website per se, I just enlarge the picture by clicking on it, and even so I just screenshot it to avoid downloading it directly.

Should I be worried about being infected by enlarging/previewing an image on Google Image Search?

Thank you for your time.
 
Solution
No, because Google is giving you the direct link to the image in question. Issues only happen if the browser runs suspicious JavaScript code from either the website's server or one of the other servers its pulling from. As Google is only giving you a direct link to the image, it's not going to run these scripts unless you visit the site.
No, because Google is giving you the direct link to the image in question. Issues only happen if the browser runs suspicious JavaScript code from either the website's server or one of the other servers its pulling from. As Google is only giving you a direct link to the image, it's not going to run these scripts unless you visit the site.
 
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Ztron5

Reputable
May 4, 2020
13
0
4,510
No, because Google is giving you the direct link to the image in question. Issues only happen if the browser runs suspicious JavaScript code from either the website's server or one of the other servers its pulling from. As Google is only giving you a direct link to the image, it's not going to run these scripts unless you visit the site.
Thank you for the explanation!