8 ms·

Opera now protects you from cryptojacking attacks

96 points by lainon 9y ago

nxsynonym 9y ago
Good move by Opera. Really hoping FF/Chrome adopt the extensions as standard features soon.
paulryanrogers 9y ago
Didn't say 'how'. I'm curious if the blacklisting approach will scale
dimonomid 9y ago
Good to know! Opera is an awesome browser which very few people use. I do though.
- CapacitorSet 9y ago
  >Opera is an awesome browser which very few people use. I thought well of it, until it got acquired by the Chinese. How has it been since?
  - liquidise 9y ago
    I moved to Opera a few years ago because it performed better than other browsers when kept open for weeks on end. Its ram usage would often clock in at multiple gigabytes less than chrome or firefox over the same time frame even when keeping < 10 tabs open. It allows total customization of keyboard shortcuts and has been an excellent experience. Their iOS version has a built in ad-blocker which prompted me to switch on my phone as well. Just this week i swapped to Firefix quantum to test the waters here. My initial reactions are fairly muted. It is almost an identical experience given my browsing and development habits. If anything, i would say i still prefer the speed of Opera's (well, Blink's) dev tools.
    - craftyguy 9y ago
      > Its ram usage would often clock in at multiple gigabytes less than chrome or firefox Well that's funny, because Opera is based on the Blink engine (which chrome/chromium use as well.), so the memory usage should be very close to the same as Chrome.
    - dimonomid 9y ago
      I moved to Opera for similar reasons, plus one more: it supports a MRU order for Ctrl+Tab, which Chrome doesn't support and doesn't even allow extensions to support. I literally can't understand why so many people (who use and develop Chrome) think that MRU is the right thing for Alt+Tab but not for Ctrl+Tab. Sad.
  - netsharc 9y ago
    Jon von Tetzchner, the remaining co-founder of Opera (the other one, Geir Ivarsøy, has passed away, RIP) has now launched another browser, called Vivaldi. It's also based on Chromium, so Chrome extensions are compatible with it. And it's probably what Opera would've become...
B-Con 9y ago
Opera blog post: https://blogs.opera.com/desktop/2017/12/opera-50-beta-rc-cryptocurrency-mining-protection/ https://blogs.opera.com/desktop/2017/12/opera-50-beta-rc-cry... > After we recently updated the rules for our built-in ad blocker mechanism, we eliminated cryptocurrency mining scripts that overuse your device’s computing ability. Simply enable Opera’s ad blocker to prevent cryptocurrency mining sites from doing their dirty work on your computer. Looks like a blacklist extension to their ad blocker.
- kodablah 9y ago
  This isn't going to work I suspect. Ad blockers work because ad companies are too lazy to make appliances/software to embed their ad packages as first party entities. This is exacerbated by the need for third party cookie access. Utilizing client CPU for mining doesn't need that. They can simply embed the JS script (which presumably would have the WASM binary embedded) and go. At least that's how I would do it if I were nefarious. And I'd add significant randomness to prevent pattern matching, but ad blockers are stupid primitive css selector or URL matchers anyways.
  - ape4 9y ago
    Mining requires lots of Math.something() functions. Maybe they can set a max for that.
    - tobyhinloopen 9y ago
      You can use other implementations that not require Math.
      - ape4 9y ago
        Just curious... like what?
  - Momquist 9y ago
    I feel whitelisting JS is becoming the sanest approach, despite all its shortcomings.
SN76477 9y ago
I don't care for Opera, but they are agile.
- rando444 9y ago
  I'm particularly impressed that they added a free VPN solution to their browser. I'm not speaking to the trust or security of this specifically, but the fact that they're offering it built-in to the browser already shows an interesting and unique approach to out-of-the-box web browsers.
guskel 9y ago
No way to ask for permission or turn the blocking off?
nuclearchicken 9y ago
Set up a Pi-hole and your entire network is protected from this dreck. The beauty of the Pi-hole approach is that you can add more blacklists on the fly and every device on the network benefits. People are actually starting to spin up Pi-hole servers at work to block this stuff. I have one running at home and it makes a noticeable difference in my network performance. Highly recommended.
nkkollaw 9y ago
I don't get it. Opera keeps being first at everything, yet they seem to fail to get any meaningful browser share (worldwide). So sad.
- clouddrover 9y ago
  In this case they're not the first. They're using this block list: https://github.com/hoshsadiq/adblock-nocoin-list https://github.com/hoshsadiq/adblock-nocoin-list Which was already being used by Brave. You can add the same list to your browser's blocker yourself. If you're using uBlock Origin be aware that by default it includes a Resource Abuse block list which contains many of the same entries as the NoCoin list, so there may be no real advantage in adding the NoCoin list. You'd have to check all the entries in both lists to see if you're gaining anything by it.
  - ChrisGranger 9y ago
    As of this writing, my uBlock Origin set-up is still making use of 18 of the NoCoin list's 73 filters, so it probably is worth installing if you're concerned about this sort of thing.
- Endy 9y ago
  And they lost some browser share from me and people I knew when they dumped Presto for becoming a Google slave.
arisAlexis 9y ago
bummer. I prefer to mine crypto than to see ads
- clouddrover 9y ago
  It's optional. It can be turned off if you want it off: https://blogs.opera.com/desktop/2017/12/opera-50-beta-rc-cryptocurrency-mining-protection/ https://blogs.opera.com/desktop/2017/12/opera-50-beta-rc-cry...
supermdguy 9y ago
Hopefully they add an option to enable it for specific sites. I think mining scripts are a great way to monetize online content. I'd much rather give away some compute time than watch ads (which I'm just going to block anyways).

96 points by lainon 9y ago

nxsynonym 9y ago

Good move by Opera. Really hoping FF/Chrome adopt the extensions as standard features soon.

paulryanrogers 9y ago

Didn't say 'how'. I'm curious if the blacklisting approach will scale

dimonomid 9y ago

Good to know! Opera is an awesome browser which very few people use. I do though.

CapacitorSet 9y ago
>Opera is an awesome browser which very few people use. I thought well of it, until it got acquired by the Chinese. How has it been since?
- liquidise 9y ago
  I moved to Opera a few years ago because it performed better than other browsers when kept open for weeks on end. Its ram usage would often clock in at multiple gigabytes less than chrome or firefox over the same time frame even when keeping < 10 tabs open. It allows total customization of keyboard shortcuts and has been an excellent experience. Their iOS version has a built in ad-blocker which prompted me to switch on my phone as well. Just this week i swapped to Firefix quantum to test the waters here. My initial reactions are fairly muted. It is almost an identical experience given my browsing and development habits. If anything, i would say i still prefer the speed of Opera's (well, Blink's) dev tools.
  - craftyguy 9y ago
    > Its ram usage would often clock in at multiple gigabytes less than chrome or firefox Well that's funny, because Opera is based on the Blink engine (which chrome/chromium use as well.), so the memory usage should be very close to the same as Chrome.
  - dimonomid 9y ago
    I moved to Opera for similar reasons, plus one more: it supports a MRU order for Ctrl+Tab, which Chrome doesn't support and doesn't even allow extensions to support. I literally can't understand why so many people (who use and develop Chrome) think that MRU is the right thing for Alt+Tab but not for Ctrl+Tab. Sad.
- netsharc 9y ago
  Jon von Tetzchner, the remaining co-founder of Opera (the other one, Geir Ivarsøy, has passed away, RIP) has now launched another browser, called Vivaldi. It's also based on Chromium, so Chrome extensions are compatible with it. And it's probably what Opera would've become...

B-Con 9y ago

Opera blog post: https://blogs.opera.com/desktop/2017/12/opera-50-beta-rc-cryptocurrency-mining-protection/ https://blogs.opera.com/desktop/2017/12/opera-50-beta-rc-cry... > After we recently updated the rules for our built-in ad blocker mechanism, we eliminated cryptocurrency mining scripts that overuse your device’s computing ability. Simply enable Opera’s ad blocker to prevent cryptocurrency mining sites from doing their dirty work on your computer. Looks like a blacklist extension to their ad blocker.

kodablah 9y ago
This isn't going to work I suspect. Ad blockers work because ad companies are too lazy to make appliances/software to embed their ad packages as first party entities. This is exacerbated by the need for third party cookie access. Utilizing client CPU for mining doesn't need that. They can simply embed the JS script (which presumably would have the WASM binary embedded) and go. At least that's how I would do it if I were nefarious. And I'd add significant randomness to prevent pattern matching, but ad blockers are stupid primitive css selector or URL matchers anyways.
- ape4 9y ago
  Mining requires lots of Math.something() functions. Maybe they can set a max for that.
  - tobyhinloopen 9y ago
    You can use other implementations that not require Math.
    - ape4 9y ago
      Just curious... like what?
- Momquist 9y ago
  I feel whitelisting JS is becoming the sanest approach, despite all its shortcomings.

SN76477 9y ago

I don't care for Opera, but they are agile.

rando444 9y ago
I'm particularly impressed that they added a free VPN solution to their browser. I'm not speaking to the trust or security of this specifically, but the fact that they're offering it built-in to the browser already shows an interesting and unique approach to out-of-the-box web browsers.

guskel 9y ago

No way to ask for permission or turn the blocking off?

nuclearchicken 9y ago

Set up a Pi-hole and your entire network is protected from this dreck. The beauty of the Pi-hole approach is that you can add more blacklists on the fly and every device on the network benefits. People are actually starting to spin up Pi-hole servers at work to block this stuff. I have one running at home and it makes a noticeable difference in my network performance. Highly recommended.

nkkollaw 9y ago

I don't get it. Opera keeps being first at everything, yet they seem to fail to get any meaningful browser share (worldwide). So sad.

clouddrover 9y ago
In this case they're not the first. They're using this block list: https://github.com/hoshsadiq/adblock-nocoin-list https://github.com/hoshsadiq/adblock-nocoin-list Which was already being used by Brave. You can add the same list to your browser's blocker yourself. If you're using uBlock Origin be aware that by default it includes a Resource Abuse block list which contains many of the same entries as the NoCoin list, so there may be no real advantage in adding the NoCoin list. You'd have to check all the entries in both lists to see if you're gaining anything by it.
- ChrisGranger 9y ago
  As of this writing, my uBlock Origin set-up is still making use of 18 of the NoCoin list's 73 filters, so it probably is worth installing if you're concerned about this sort of thing.
Endy 9y ago
And they lost some browser share from me and people I knew when they dumped Presto for becoming a Google slave.

arisAlexis 9y ago

bummer. I prefer to mine crypto than to see ads

clouddrover 9y ago
It's optional. It can be turned off if you want it off: https://blogs.opera.com/desktop/2017/12/opera-50-beta-rc-cryptocurrency-mining-protection/ https://blogs.opera.com/desktop/2017/12/opera-50-beta-rc-cry...

supermdguy 9y ago

Hopefully they add an option to enable it for specific sites. I think mining scripts are a great way to monetize online content. I'd much rather give away some compute time than watch ads (which I'm just going to block anyways).