Security → Malicious Chrome extensions on the rise

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Kaspersky Lab has observed in increase in the use of malicious Chrome extensions to compromise users. The latest pose as a Facebook video.

According to Fabio Assolini, Senior Security Researcher at Kaspersky Lab, attackers are increasingly using malicious Google Chrome extensions to compromise users.

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»www.zdnet.com/malicious- ··· 0019913/

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Users don't use enough good sense when applying extensions in a browser, according to Asssolini.

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Fixed it for him.

Downloading and using dangerous extensions stems from the same user emotion that causes people to naively harvest warez, music/videos, freeware, etc or anything else that's "free" out on the Intertubes: greed, stripped of common sense. Little or no user thought is given to the documented integrity of the author/source, the user's genuine need for the item, the item's published tech reviews, or the system risks involved - none of it. Just a sense of "Oh, goody... another kewl freebie!". It reminds me of toddlers picking up and ingesting pieces of used candy or bubble gum off the sidewalk - "but it's free, and it tastes good".

It's also what comes of unleashing "user-friendly" technology upon folks who have no clue about how the technology actually functions and, hence, the risks that come along with it.

One can safely predict that whatever "latest new thing" comes over the horizon, there will be malicious interests who exploit it or the various accessories associated with it, as long as there's some kind of "free" angle involved to cause users to suspend common sense and let their greed take over.

Slightly off-topic, but the latest chrome (29.0.1547.62 m) delivers a new extension:

No Extension Chrome In-App Payments service 0.0.4.10
 

Oh, I love being able to empty my accounts automatically.

/sarcasm

Flickr to soon feature improved facial recognition
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»www.ctvnews.ca/sci-tech/ ··· .1427308

I don't run Chrome, does Google auto-update everything these days.

Cheers ~

Yes, they do update things in the background and the service is a pain to shut off. I think I resorted to a group policy to prevent it from running, but then that breaks other stuff in Chrome, including the manual update option.

Agreed, there's probably tons of stuff sitting in MSCONFIG & Services that you wouldn't want to mess with.

+100

And that is no crime but most have zero interest in learning. That's when karma can be most rewarding (to the observer) The Germans have a word for that--schadenfreude.

Not hardly..but one can install it..... and you must have...

»thenextweb.com/google/20 ··· browser/

»www.webpronews.com/googl ··· -2013-05

»developer.chrome.com/app ··· nts.html

I hadn't downloaded this on purpose by any means.

Maybe it was downloaded without knowledge, but on the latest update yesterday did a check via CCleaner and it was there, but wasn't before, at least last time I checked, so how it became installed is beyond me.

I do not have a google account either, do not sync google etc, and just use the search engine if any of that helps?

I use Chromium to avoid that. I use it mainly for work purposes, since Chromium offers the least hassle when accessing a site with a self-signed certificate and I do that constantly at work.

Can you elaborate on that as I'm an IE person. What's Chromium compared to Google Chrome ? Is that a Dev fork build or ?

I have the latest update and so do 10 people I know in the neighborhood and we did not get that extension or anything close to it..and I have both the development channel and the regular one...you must have then a gmail account and/or wallet ?

Which makes me wonder ever more.

The user account from my other post and the subsequent errors has caused a user profile error even with all new settings - it cost me a new install to fix the limited user error.

One of the cleanup tools listed created the Chrome user bug....

Chromium is the browser Google Chrome is built on.

Thanks for this, sivran

I've stopped using Google Chrome for now.
Even with SafeScript, Ghostery and AdBlock Plus in place something went wrong.

Security isn't easy.

Blake

Me thinks you had also been using an extension in Chrome called "Extensions Manager (aka Switcher)" . Is that correct ? Ever figure out why it is... No Extension Chrome In-App Payments service 0.0.4.10 and what the "No" means ?

The log of the plug-in/extension was a text report of it from CCleaner showing it disabled, hence "no".

I only ever had 4 extensions, AdBlock Plus, Ghostery, GhosteryFixer and ScriptSafe.

I still did not know how it was installed but saved a copy of all the security cleanup logs if anyone was ever interested in what processes, system files etc were on the computer.

No A/V or rootkit tool picked anything up other than a few installed with toolbars/adwares attached.
They never are installed though, I am particular about install packages selections and try to obtain the toolbar free versions if available.

Now I'm all squeaky clean from a fresh loading.

What extensions are safer?

Firefox or Chrome?

I don't run Chrome so I can't answer that. I would seem to me that an Achilles heel of Mozilla Firefox is extensions.