New ask Hacker News story: Ask HN: Are People Overlooking the Dangers of Browser Extensions?
Ask HN: Are People Overlooking the Dangers of Browser Extensions?
22 by CM30 | 6 comments on Hacker News.
Because as strange as it sounds, the generous permissions they often ask for and the fact they can modify all the pages you're viewing mean that they'd theoretically be a great vector for man in the middle attacks, and bring back the exact problems https supposedly solved. They also seem like a great way to manipulate audiences with 'fake news' or 'misinformation'. Imagine a fake version of adblock that replaced news site content with propaganda or what not. That could be far worse than anything any 'Russian trolls' ever could do, and could even let an adversary manipulate a group into thinking the world is against them (since their posts about such content would appear as gibberish to everything else, and get them banned from social media sites). Just feels like there are a ton of sneaky things that could be done here, and that the way Google and co are handling these things could be extremely dangerous in the long run.
22 by CM30 | 6 comments on Hacker News.
Because as strange as it sounds, the generous permissions they often ask for and the fact they can modify all the pages you're viewing mean that they'd theoretically be a great vector for man in the middle attacks, and bring back the exact problems https supposedly solved. They also seem like a great way to manipulate audiences with 'fake news' or 'misinformation'. Imagine a fake version of adblock that replaced news site content with propaganda or what not. That could be far worse than anything any 'Russian trolls' ever could do, and could even let an adversary manipulate a group into thinking the world is against them (since their posts about such content would appear as gibberish to everything else, and get them banned from social media sites). Just feels like there are a ton of sneaky things that could be done here, and that the way Google and co are handling these things could be extremely dangerous in the long run.
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