Google Chrome extensions. They’re a cool feature chrome provides, where you can add almost anything to enhance your experience while browsing the internet. For example, one of the most common extensions people use is AdBlocker. Although, if you thought these extensions were harmless, you were wrong. For the past two years, hundreds of Chrome extensions were participating in extension fraud. After months of research, Google pulled over 500 extensions that utilized such malicious behavior. The developers had designed their extensions in a way that when the user opened up the internet/opened a new page after successfully installing the extension, the user would be waiting for the page to load, the unknowingly would be routed through thirty other websites. These websites would be advertisements, where each time someone clicked on the website, the developer of the extension would receive a profit. All of this occurred within the few seconds you were waiting for a website to open – and you had no idea. Thousands clicks would go to ad marketing just by you opening up a new page after downloading an extension. On the other hand, the companies who were getting views were also unaware that a huge percentage of views on their websites weren’t actually people viewing it – companies could only see their view count. By downloading these extensions, you allowed information about your device to be accessed. The websites a user unknowingly was sent to could infect your computer, as it could check if different security aspects of your device were patched and up-to-date and furthermore could install malware. Despite all the legal factors with fraud and theft, one of the most alarming components of this cyber security scandal is that the user had no idea this was occurring and was hidden within in extra two minutes of loading time.
sources:
Google pulls 500 malicious Chrome extensions after researcher tip-off
https://www.wired.com/story/over-500-chrome-extensions-secretly-uploaded-private-data/
FIXED: This article was full of things that surprised to me. For instance I didn’t even know that malware existed within Chrome extensions. Learning that Google has removed these is wonderful news to millions of Americans. Frequently in the news you will hear news about companies like Google and Facebook “stealing” and selling peoples personal data. This is one of the first pieces that I have read claiming that they are doing the opposite. From a public relations point of view this is outstanding and allows many users to view Google in a new light. One of the scariest parts about the internet that all of this was being done without the users knowledge. By Google addressing this problem it makes me feel safer while using their browser. This is also significant news for marketing teams. A significant amount of companies advertisement money goes towards websites. Knowing that many of these views aren’t even real is vital to saving money. All in all, I am more than happy to see Google taking progressive steps in protecting their users.
I think this goes to show just how we think that we are making smart decisions when it comes to online security when in reality we are not. Its add-ons like these that we think are making our internet searches more secure and stress free. These extensions as stated above were used to look at the internals of the computer you were using and try to install viruses that could potentially steal your information and also target you for certain adds in other places. This article was an eye opener for me as someone who uses multiple browser extensions. However, most of my extensions are used on Firefox which is know to have slightly better security protocols when it comes to malware. This all goes to show just how your information inst really safe when you are accessing the internet.
It’s not often that we get to hear about Google in a good sense. I think that the fact that they took the time to research and remove extensions like these is encouraging and has restored a bit of faith in large corporations for me. I was completely unaware that this was even possible, and even less aware that it was happening everyday to people like me. Companies as large as Google inherit some form of corporate social responsibility, and I think they made the right move both for all of their users and for themselves. I would be interested to learn how Google found out about this issue and how they tackled it. Something as hidden as this seems like it would be hard to find and remove all the harmful software. The article I linked below gives some insight into how and why Google was able to detect and eliminate this issue.
https://www.wired.com/story/chrome-extension-malware/
This article was full of surprised to me. For instance I didn’t even know that malware existed within Chrome extensions. Learning that Google has removed these is wonderful news to millions of Americans. Frequently in the news you will hear news about companies like Google and Facebook “stealing” and selling peoples personal data. This is one of the first pieces that I have read claiming that they are doing the opposite. From a public relations point of view this is outstanding and allows many users to view Google in a new light. One of the scariest parts about the internet that all of this was being done without the users knowledge. By Google addressing this problem it makes me feel safer while using their browser. This is also significant news for marketing teams. A significant amount of companies advertisement money goes towards websites. Knowing that many of these views aren’t even real is vital to saving money. All in all, I am more than happy to see Google taking progressive steps in protecting their users.