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LinkedIn is searching your browser extensions

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Re: LinkedIn is searching your browser extensions

#441

Post by gabbagool »

haswell wrote: post #14

The 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…

Just because someone lets the electrician (LinkedIn) into their home (browser) doesn't mean they can do whatever the hell they want that isn't expressly prohibited. If the electrician wants to rifle through my desk drawers, they should ask for permission, and I will politely tell them to leave.

Re: LinkedIn is searching your browser extensions

#442

Post by alt227 »

luxuryballs wrote: post #247
gwerbin wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Almost certainly they are using that for audience segmentation and ad targeting. Clever and disgusting. This isn't the invention of some evil moustache-twirling executive, this was the invention of an employee or group of employees who value money more than morals. We should think of such employees as henchmen.

if they do a better job at showing me an ad that might be relevant to me, how is that disgusting? if I have to see an ad at all I at least want them to give it their best shot

I cant believe that people still have the attitude that the trillions of dollars being invested in all this technology and tracking is just to give them a more relevant ad.

Do people really not remember scandals like Cambridge Analytica, and realise that these ads combined with social media feeds can be used to literally control and manipulate peoples decisions and behavoir?

Theres a reason Facebook and Youtube just got sued for being intentionally addictive attention machines.

Re: LinkedIn is searching your browser extensions

#444

Post by Sohcahtoa82 »

newsoftheday wrote: post #306
ronjouch wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Ad blockers" nowadays do much more. From the horse’s mouth, which describes itself as a “wide-spectrum content blocker” [1]: “uBlock Origin (uBO) is a CPU and memory-efficient wide-spectrum content blocker for Chromium and Firefox. It blocks ads, trackers, coin miners, popups, annoying anti-blockers, malware sites, etc., by default using EasyList, EasyPrivacy, Peter Lowe's Blocklist, Online Malicious URL Blocklist,…

I'd like to install uBlock Origin, when I try, Chrome warns it needs the permission to, "Read and change all your data on all websites". That seems excessive, to give that much power to one extension. I currently use no extensions to keep my security posture high.

> "Read and change all your data on all websites"

What a silly complaint. How is an ad blocker supposed to work if it can't read and change the data on a website?

You might as well complain that your Camera app wants access to your camera.

> I currently use no extensions to keep my security posture high.

Ironically, skipping uBlock Origin because of the security concern is lessening your security posture. Are you familiar with the term "malvertising"?

Re: LinkedIn is searching your browser extensions

#445

Post by ziml77 »

hedora wrote: post #253
Someone wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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)

The list of queried extensions includes things that would be used by particular religious groups, and people with certain medical conditions.

Those being in the list doesn't mean that's what they're looking for. Take a look at the database of extensions, there's far more extensions that don't seem limited to any particular group. The author just called those out specifically because they're perfect for implying nefarious intent.

Re: LinkedIn is searching your browser extensions

#446

Post by lstodd »

i_love_retros wrote: post #249
lastofthemojito wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> this is why I run ad blockers. It's pretty wild that we live in a world where the actual FBI has recommended we use ad blockers to protect ourselves, and if everyone actually listened, much of the Internet (and economy) as we know it would disappear. The FBI is like "you should protect yourself from the way that the third largest company in the world does business", and the average person's response is "nah, that w…

[flagged]

> the state is a corrupt cesspool.

Exactly because no one in his right mind is going to work in "state". So the "state" is more like 95% "fucking idiots" as you put it, and that is self-reinforcing.

Re: LinkedIn is searching your browser extensions

#447

Post by cyral »

grub5000 wrote: post #112
VladVladikoff wrote: post #69

>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.

This is incredibly normal language and quite close to how I would write this quote, so what makes you think this is LLM text?

It might be normal language but lets say maybe 5% of real human blog writers use short punchy phrases like that. The noticeable problem is now its 50% of blog posts because almost every single AI authored post uses the same phrasing, it's tiring knowing you are just reading ChatGPT output. Its usually part of a low-effort funnel to guide you to some product/service.

Re: LinkedIn is searching your browser extensions

#448

Post by mcmcmc »

lastofthemojito wrote: post #147
haswell wrote: post #14

The 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…

> this is why I run ad blockers. It's pretty wild that we live in a world where the actual FBI has recommended we use ad blockers to protect ourselves, and if everyone actually listened, much of the Internet (and economy) as we know it would disappear. The FBI is like "you should protect yourself from the way that the third largest company in the world does business", and the average person's response is "nah, that w…

The FBI also recommended people use commercial VPNs… coincidentally they don’t need a warrant to spy on communications that leave the country

Re: LinkedIn is searching your browser extensions

#450

Post by whimsicalism »

haswell wrote: post #14

The 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…

this is obviously not fingerprinting code to anyone with a brain, it's about scraping
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