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LinkedIn is searching your browser extensions
131–140 of 836 posts
Re: LinkedIn is searching your browser extensions
#132Sounds like containers and potentially adblocking and js blocking prevent this. For my part, I use linked in on my "god dammnit I hate corporate websites so much" browser which is used only for medical bill pay and amazon / wal mart purchases and then monthly bills. Could LinkedIn get something from me there? Potentially, but they're also not really following me around the web. I think given this I'll go install a 3r…
You can use Firefox with different profiles and configure it to launch particular profile directly, without launching default profile and using about:profiles.
Firefox with a non-default profile can be created like that:
./firefox -CreateProfile "profile-name /home/user/.mozilla/firefox/profile-dir/"
# For linkedin that would be:
./firefox -CreateProfile "linkedin /home/user/.mozilla/firefox/linkedin/"
./firefox -profile "/home/user/.mozilla/firefox/profile-dir/"
# For linkedin that would be:
./firefox -profile "/home/user/.mozilla/firefox/linkedin/"
- create a copy of it, say, /usr/bin/firefox-linkedin
- adjust the relevant line, adding the -profile argument
Of course, "./firefox" from examples above should be replaced with the actual path to executable. For default installation of Firefox the path would be in /usr/bin/firefox script.
So, you can have a separate profiles for something sensitive/invasive (linkedin, shops, etc.) and then you can have a separate profile for everything else.
And each profile can have its own set of extensions.
Re: LinkedIn is searching your browser extensions
#133Earlier quoted context omitted.
When "the browser is the OS", scanning that is a pretty big chunk of "your computer".
but the language of "your computer" implies files on your computer, as it would be what people commonly call it. Merely just the extension is not enough. If it has the ability to scan your bookmarks, or visited site history, that would lend more credence to using the term "computer". The title ought to have said "linkedIn illegally scans your browser", and that would make clear what is being done without being sensat…
> but the language of "your computer" implies files on your computer, as it would be what people commonly call it. Merely just the extension is not enough.
But the language of "your computer" also implies software on your computer including but not limited to Chrome extensions.
Re: LinkedIn is searching your browser extensions
#134The headline seems pretty misleading. Here’s what seems to actually be going on: > Every time you open LinkedIn in a Chrome-based browser, LinkedIn’s JavaScript executes a silent scan of your installed browser extensions. The scan probes for thousands of specific extensions by ID, collects the results, encrypts them, and transmits them to LinkedIn’s servers. This does seem invasive. It also seems like what I’d expect…
How is probing your browser for installed extensions not "scanning your computer"? Calling the title misleading because they didn't breach the browser sandbox is wrong when this is clearly a scenario most people didn't think was possible. Chrome added extensionId randomization with the change to V3, so it's clearly not an intended scenario. > vs. something inherently sinister (e.g. “they’re checking to see if you’re…
In the same way that scanning and identifying your microwave for food you put inside it is not the same as scanning your house and reading the letters in your postbox.
Your browser is a subset of your computer and lives inside a sandbox. Breaching that sandbox is certainly a much more interesting topic than breaking GDPR by browser fingerprinting.
Re: LinkedIn is searching your browser extensions
#135>The user is never asked. Never told. LinkedIn’s privacy policy does not mention it. OMG is literally every article written with LLMs these days I just can't anymore. It's all so tiring.
How is that quote in any way demonstrative of this being written by LLM? You do know that LLMs were trained on the internet and every digitized text they could get their hands on? You are jumping at shadows, calm down already.
Re: LinkedIn is searching your browser extensions
#136The headline seems pretty misleading. Here’s what seems to actually be going on: > Every time you open LinkedIn in a Chrome-based browser, LinkedIn’s JavaScript executes a silent scan of your installed browser extensions. The scan probes for thousands of specific extensions by ID, collects the results, encrypts them, and transmits them to LinkedIn’s servers. This does seem invasive. It also seems like what I’d expect…
> no available getAllExtensions()
Well great there is no avalable 'getAllFiles()' or such either because they'd be scanning your files for "fingerprinting" as well.
> alarmist framing
Well they literally searching your computer for applications/extensions that you have installed? (and to an extent you can infer what are some of the desktop applications you have based on that too)
Re: LinkedIn is searching your browser extensions
#137Reminder for windows control alt shift windows L
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Re: LinkedIn is searching your browser extensions
#138Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why is it possible for a web site to determine what browser extensions I have installed? If there are legitimate uses, why isn't this gated behind a permission prompt, like things like location and camera?
Who makes browsers? Ad companies. Of course Google is going to back door their browser.
> Who makes browsers? Ad companies.
> Of course Google is going to back door their browser.
Aside from the fact that other browsers exist, this makes no sense because Google would stand to gain more by being the only entity that can surveil the user this way, vs. allowing others to collect data on the user without having to go through Google's services (and pay them).
Re: LinkedIn is searching your browser extensions
#139The most obvious reason for this is browser fingerprinting, right? So your visits to other websites can be linked to your Linkedin identity? Or no?
They also try to profile for things like political beliefs.
I don’t see this article showing that. They query for extensions that could be used to do that, and that likely already is illegal, but those queries could solely be used to uniquely identify users (grabbing more bits makes it less likely to get collisions)
Re: LinkedIn is searching your browser extensions
#140The headline seems pretty misleading. Here’s what seems to actually be going on: > Every time you open LinkedIn in a Chrome-based browser, LinkedIn’s JavaScript executes a silent scan of your installed browser extensions. The scan probes for thousands of specific extensions by ID, collects the results, encrypts them, and transmits them to LinkedIn’s servers. This does seem invasive. It also seems like what I’d expect…
I've been avoiding Chrome-based browsers for many years now but have only recently become aware of how catastrophically low the Firefox market share is. I'm kind of shocked that more people aren't choosing to avoid Chrome.