4 ms·

"In a technical analysis shared with ZDNet, AdGuard said all extensions loaded malicious code from the fly-analytics.com domain, and then proceeded to quietly i

"In a technical analysis shared with ZDNet, AdGuard said all extensions loaded malicious code from the fly-analytics.com domain, and then proceeded to quietly inject ads inside Google and Bing search results." The original post has some details and recommendations: https://adguard.com/en/blog/fake-ad-blockers-part-3.html https://adguard.com/en/blog/fake-ad-blockers-part-3.html What I don't quite understand is how do people make money from these things without getting caught? Is it not obvious where the money goes as people are getting paid from the fraud? Or is it more like no one cares?

dheera 6y ago
Add 0.0.0.0 fly-analytics.com to /etc/hosts
- ffpip 6y ago
  My router has a built in word filterer. So I just added- analytic, adservice, pixel,doubleclick, googlead,facebook, applauncher, Xiaomi,track, taboola and outbrain. This only applies to subdomains and domains(due to Https). So adservice.google.com is blocked but google.com/adservice is allowed.
  - XCSme 6y ago
    So you have TrackMania, trackpad, race track blocked?
    - ffpip 6y ago
      If those are websites, then no. All websites are opened within my browser. The keyword thing applies only to apps. My browser (firefox) has DNS over HTTPS built in. So every request goes to cloudflare-dns.com. My router only sees these requests when I use Firefox - mozilla.cloudflare-dns.com I use uBlock Origin in Firefox. So I can control whatever I want within the browser. This a very good approach to adblock on a whole network.
linuxftw 6y ago
> quietly inject ads inside Google and Bing search results This is what Google and Bing do already, it's imperceptible to the average user. Are these 3rd party ad extensions any worse than Google or Microsoft? They all vacuum up your data and show your ads.
- pirocks 6y ago
  Whilst I agree that this makes little to no difference to the average user, it is slightly different. One can sue Google/MS. Google/MS likely already have all your data already while these randoms probably don't. Google/MS have security teams while whoever made these extensions probably doesn't. A more interesting question would be, if these extension makers where as transparent as Google/MS, where sueable, and had decent security, would these extensions become okay. The answer is obviously no, but I'm not sure why.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
tyingq 6y ago
"What I don't quite understand is how do people make money from these things without getting caught?" I'm not sure it's illegal. And it's pretty clear Google doesn't care enough to review extensions.

dheera 6y ago

Add 0.0.0.0 fly-analytics.com to /etc/hosts

ffpip 6y ago
My router has a built in word filterer. So I just added- analytic, adservice, pixel,doubleclick, googlead,facebook, applauncher, Xiaomi,track, taboola and outbrain. This only applies to subdomains and domains(due to Https). So adservice.google.com is blocked but google.com/adservice is allowed.
- XCSme 6y ago
  So you have TrackMania, trackpad, race track blocked?
  - ffpip 6y ago
    If those are websites, then no. All websites are opened within my browser. The keyword thing applies only to apps. My browser (firefox) has DNS over HTTPS built in. So every request goes to cloudflare-dns.com. My router only sees these requests when I use Firefox - mozilla.cloudflare-dns.com I use uBlock Origin in Firefox. So I can control whatever I want within the browser. This a very good approach to adblock on a whole network.

linuxftw 6y ago

> quietly inject ads inside Google and Bing search results This is what Google and Bing do already, it's imperceptible to the average user. Are these 3rd party ad extensions any worse than Google or Microsoft? They all vacuum up your data and show your ads.

pirocks 6y ago
Whilst I agree that this makes little to no difference to the average user, it is slightly different. One can sue Google/MS. Google/MS likely already have all your data already while these randoms probably don't. Google/MS have security teams while whoever made these extensions probably doesn't. A more interesting question would be, if these extension makers where as transparent as Google/MS, where sueable, and had decent security, would these extensions become okay. The answer is obviously no, but I'm not sure why.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

tyingq 6y ago

"What I don't quite understand is how do people make money from these things without getting caught?" I'm not sure it's illegal. And it's pretty clear Google doesn't care enough to review extensions.