Your mental health internet search may lead to malware

Your online search for certain mental health terms may unexpectedly lead to malware.

New research conducted by Beyond Identity, a passwordless identity management provider, analyzed high-volume mental health search terms and found that many of them involve an elevated risk of encountering links leading to software that can steal data or damage your device or network.

The term "meditation music" yielded links with critical risk, according to Beyond Identity. Users should be particularly wary of downloading music for their meditation practice when searching this term.

While none of the other phrases that Beyond Identity assessed resulted in critical risk links, all of the following terms were considered medium risk or greater: "psychiatrist near me," "meditation music," "virtual therapy," "mental health services," "ADHD treatment," "breathing exercise," "mindfulness meditation," "anxiety treatment," "depression treatment," and "how to meditate."

The report urged consumers to "tread cautiously" when specifically searching for "meditation music," "psychiatrist near me," and "virtual therapy." Nearly a third of the top link results in those categories had an elevated risk of malware.

Beyond Identity's research focused on malware risk connected to work-related searches, but the company also looked broadly at mental health terms. It found that the latter tied for second for greatest malware risk with searches for work-related training and courses amongst all categories, an indication of how aggressively bad actors are looking to exploit people's interest in discovering online content and resources for their well-being.

These mental health search terms yielded links with an elevated risk for malware. Credit: Beyond Identity

To conduct the research, Beyond Identity selected popular terms that exceeded 6,000 searches in the U.S. last month. It then collected the first non-sponsored 50 link results yielded by Google Chrome and ran them through a malware detector tool. (Your individual algorithm may affect which links would be top results in such a search.)

Links were flagged if the website blocked the malware detection tool, used outdated software, or contained identifiable malware. A site that uses outdated software or deploys a malware detection tool can be prone to malicious code.

Simply visiting a site laced with malware can infect your device, as can clicking on an ad embedded with malware, interacting with pop-ups, and downloading infected media files, software, or documents.

A panic-inducing malware infection is the last thing you want when searching for mental health information. If you're suspicious of your search results, it's best to trust only reputable websites and your healthcare provider.