Acutally, when Firefox is given an invalid URL, it doesn't attempt to determine the actual URL. Instead, it performs a "I'm feeling lucky" google search when confused and returns the first matching web page (see graphic).
So, whenever a Firefox or Mozilla browser user types an an invalid (malformed) URL into the Firefox address bar (like http//www.google.com - no colon) - Google redirects him to the Microsoft homepage as the top result for the search term http on Google is Microsoft Corporation.
Similarly, if the user types a secure malformed URL (starting with https//), he is redirected to the Google Adwords page as that's the first result for https on Google.
Source: Why do Malformed URLs Redirect to Microsoft?
Find this article at: http://labnol.blogspot.com/2006/03/invalid-url-in-firefox-microsoft.html
web: http://www.labnol.org/ email: amit@labnol.org
Reader Comments
Not with me. When I typed http//google.com, I get a screen that says:
The requested URL could not be retrieved
While trying to retrieve the URL: http://http//www.google.com
The following error was encountered:
Unable to determine IP address from host name for http
The dnsserver returned:
Name Error: The domain name does not exist.
This means that:
The cache was not able to resolve the hostname presented in the URL.
Check if the address is correct.
Your cache administrator is webmaster.
Generated Thu, 09 Mar 2006 11:33:36 GMT by alphaxp3 (squid/2.5.STABLE9-20050408)
I think it depends on the server in question.
Written on 9/3/06 5:05 PM
Ambuj,
Thanks for sharing this.
After your comment, I digged a little bit more on this topic.
Basically, it is setting (keyword.url) in Firefox which can even be disabled (keyword.enabled)
When the keyword.enabled setting is False, Firefox displays an error message indicating the entered information is not a valid URL. (the same error that you get on typing a malformed URL)
When entering information in the Location Bar, Mozilla attempts to convert the information into a usable URI. For example, mozilla.org is automatically converted to http://mozilla.org/.
When Mozilla is unable to discern what URL the user wanted, the information that was entered may be submitted to an Internet Keywords service.
The default Internet Keywords provider in Firefox—Google’s I’m Feeling Lucky search—is the reason why typing a malformed URI such as http//www.mozilla.org will automatically direct you to Microsoft’s website.
The keyword.URL and keyword.enabled values can be modified by typing about:config in the Firefox URL bar.
Written on 9/3/06 5:30 PM