https://techcrunch.com/2022/12/22/fbi-ad-blocker/
This holiday season, consider giving the gift of security with an ad blocker.
That's the takeaway message from an unlikely source — the FBI — which this week issued an alert warning that cybercriminals are using online ads in search results with the ultimate goal of stealing or extorting money from victims.
In a pre-holiday public service announcement, the FBI said that cybercriminals are buying ads to impersonate legitimate brands, like cryptocurrency exchanges. Ads are often placed at the top of search results but with "minimum distinction" between the ads and the search results, the feds say, which can look identical to the brands that the cybercriminals are impersonating. Malicious ads are also used to trick victims into installing malware disguised as genuine apps, which can steal passwords and deploy file-encrypting ransomware.
One of the FBI's recommendations for consumers is to install an ad blocker [...]
[...] If you're looking for a widely recommended ad blocker, uBlock Origin is a simple, low-memory ad blocker that works for most browsers, like Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Microsoft Edge and Opera, plus the extension is open source so anyone can look at the code and make sure it's safe to run.
You can also get content blockers for Android and iOS, which block ads from loading on your device [...]
Related Stories
Microsoft has spent a lot of time and energy over the last few months adding generative AI features to all its products, particularly its long-standing, long-struggling Bing search engine. And now the company is working on fusing this fast-moving, sometimes unsettling new technology with some old headaches: ads.
In a blog post earlier this week, Microsoft VP Yusuf Mehdi said the company was "exploring placing ads in the chat experience," one of several things the company is doing "to share the ad revenue with partners whose content contributed to the chat response." The company is also looking into ways to let Bing Chat show sources for its work, sort of like the ways Google, Bing, and other search engines display a source link below snippets of information they think might answer the question you asked.
Related:
Even the FBI Says You Should Use an Ad Blocker (20221227)
Microsoft Explores a Potentially Risky New Market (20220420)
Microsoft is Testing Ads in the Windows 11 File Explorer (20220314)
Sen. Ron Wyden Calls for an Investigation of the Ad-Blocking Industry (20200115)
Windows 10 App Starts Showing Ads, Microsoft Says You Can't Remove Them (20191215)
Microsoft Experiments with Ads in Windows Email (20181117)
(Score: 3, Funny) by billbellum on Wednesday December 28 2022, @09:14AM (2 children)
Don't get many ads from the FBI, unless they are recruiting.
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Thursday December 29 2022, @04:40PM
You either already have the ad blocker or you simply haven't noticed the FBI ads!
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Freeman on Friday December 30 2022, @01:49AM
Haven't you seen that splash screen at the start of pretty much every movie since color was a thing?
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 5, Insightful) by KritonK on Wednesday December 28 2022, @09:51AM (3 children)
So, is removing a browser's ability to implement ad blocking a federal offence now?
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Thursday December 29 2022, @08:41PM (2 children)
Insightful? Hardly! It's not as if there is any law that says that something the FBI likes is mandatory. This ain't China, the FBI doesn't make laws, they enforce Federal laws; laws CONGRESS passes.
Is the opposite of insightful "fucking stupid"? I'd have agreed with a +5 funny, which is what I suspect you were going for.
Impeach Donald Palpatine and his sidekick Elon Vader
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 30 2022, @12:29AM
I sorta get your point, but since there's too much unfunny truth in the post, I find it more insightful.
I'd argue your post is a bit off-topic, and certainly not beneficial, but you're entitled to express your opinion. Although a bit caustic and abrasive, not worthy of a downmod. Plus I'm not a big fan of downmodding; it's kind of a zero-sum game.
Is "CONGRESS" singular or plural? Brits, the colonists need some help over here! :)
(Score: 2) by KritonK on Saturday December 31 2022, @07:25AM
Thank you for calling me "fucking stupid".
And, BTW, since my post is currently rated +4, you could have rated it funny, making it get the "+5 funny" rating that you think it deserves. I was going for funny, anyway.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by anubi on Wednesday December 28 2022, @10:11AM (10 children)
I've posted this before, but it's something that needs to be made known.
A virus research company is running a free public virus scanning service
You may send them a file, and they will use multiple scanning engines on it and let you know if they found it to be malicious.
If you sent them a zonker, they now have a copy of it for their own analysis and statistics of where it came from.
virustotal.com/gui/home/search
A big bonus for me is they accept MD5 of android APK. If they have seen it before, this a really quick way of running a quickie "say, is this one safe?" by them, and if they have, the tell you what they have on it. Otherwise, you may have to send them the actual file.
For my Android stuff, I have been using the "HashDroid" MD5 digester available from F-droid.
https://f-droid.org/en/packages/com.hobbyone.HashDroid/ [f-droid.org]
With this, I can quickly get a good idea whether or not I trust an anonymous downloaded APK install.
Unfortunately, the code behind today's multimegabyte browsers, some may have deliberate backdoors inserted with financial
encouragement, protected via copyright law, a lot of obfuscation, and drm, is a real mystery to verify it's trustworthiness.
We can thank our elected legislators for this mess of untrusted computing, brought on by those who have made a business model out of getting people to cooperate with their contract, but are forbidden to read and verify it's content.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 2) by crafoo on Wednesday December 28 2022, @04:32PM (1 child)
great post, thanks for the link and info
(Score: 3, Insightful) by anubi on Thursday December 29 2022, @02:10AM
Thanks.
I feel posting stuff like that is precisely what Soylent News is all about. I've gotten a LOT of very helpful tidbits off fellow Soylentils.
This is just the fruit of sowing such seeds.
Sharing begets sharing, greed begets greed, and that particular seed is the worst. I am currently watching that one destroy an entire civilization. I really cherish those that have a mindset typically found in places like here.
Sharing, aka Teamwork.
Thanks for leaving me an opening...I just had to get my two cents in.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 3, Interesting) by RS3 on Wednesday December 28 2022, @05:03PM (4 children)
Yes, excellent post and info.
Virustotal scanning has been embedded in some Windows mechanisms for years (I forget where, maybe Windows Update, I know I've seen it somewhere).
Another similar one I've used for years is: https://virusscan.jotti.org/ [jotti.org]
Over the years I've had a few systems crash because a malware scanner, on a false-positive, will quarantine or delete a critical system file without asking. Generally I've had to boot with some alternate media, copy file(s) from another system, carry on.
Many of "Nirsoft's" awesome utilities get flagged as "malicious / malware" when they're not inherently bad, just powerful tools that could be used by a malicious person. In some locations I've had WiFi system filters block Nirsoft and other attempts to download such things (proxy sites are your workaround).
"ClamAV" is great, but seems to give the most false positive results, so again, test a questionable file at virustotal or jotti.
Most anti-virus software severely (IMHO) bogs a system down. The one I've been using is McAfee's "Real Protect". Rather than constantly scanning everything (and I mean everything) your computer does, it just watches a bunch of core OS files and processes, and flags anything trying to mess with them. It will pop up a flag if I use some Nirsoft stuff like smsniff, nmap, and a few others.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by anubi on Thursday December 29 2022, @02:40AM (3 children)
Thanks for sharing that. I've now a few more things to try against misbehaving code.
I sure miss my old way of doing things. I felt so at home with my old assembler. I would have no problem writing a database in it. And I read of all these problems airlines are having. I am convinced they have good stuff; they don't know how to use it, while the ones that did have knowledge retired, replaced by off-the-shelf generic graduates lacking experience.
Even the MBA will recognize the value of the skills of the past when it comes to their COBOL mainframes, yet fail to comprehend why an engineer won't let go of an old CAD system that was in place before all this DRM, licensing, enforced internet connectivity which is in place for mandatory behind-your-back "upgrades" from anyone who has the access codes. Even then, those codes are already defined in contract verbiage as a shared item.
Management types love that stuff. Job security. Make a whole lot of problems that must be renogiated.
Engineers hate it We gotta make the stuff work.
I agree too that the antivirus is the problem.
It's the difference between having a skilled doctor examine you, or having some trainee go over you, checklists and troubleshooting charts in hand, along with time limits to arrive at a conclusion.
I want Doctor House, M.D.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 4, Interesting) by RS3 on Thursday December 29 2022, @03:44AM
Writing a database in assembly. Makes me wish I had been born 30 or so years earlier, that I might have done such things. Sure, you can still do it, but not as a Windows process! Ugh!
I'm doing some work at a tiny company I occasionally do work for. They seem to buy a new printer at least every year. I have _no_ idea why. So there's this HP (ptewey) OfficeJet Pro 8025e that I'm trying to print through. My Win7 laptop sees it, adds it, but spat out a ton of garbaged up paper. Checking HP's website- only Win10 and 11 are "supported". They do have older files available, but I'm not going to download and install an over 200MB file on MY computer and risk the mess it might cause, and still have no printer working. I'm okay with change if it's necessary and things get better, but far too much of the world is hooked on change for the sake of change. I have better things to do! Now I'm trying to print to another (Epson) printer in the next room... Win7's stupid "add a printer" wizard must have forgotten to bring his magic pixie dust. Sigh. I might have to print it at home on a much older HP laser that Just Works.
I hear you re: Doctor House, MD. Probably my favorite show of all time. I think I've seen every episode 3 times, many of them more than that. I hope nobody takes this the wrong way, but I identify with him a bit too much. I'm a pretty good diagnostician, and often get great compliments and praise for things I do and fix, but I'm, for some reason I can't understand, greatly misunderstood by people. But I don't act like House, nor irritate people (not intentionally, anyway!), so nobody treats me badly (other than my sister...)
I don't know much about the airlines' problems, but last I looked into it they mostly use software and systems from Unisys? Pretty much a monopoly lock-in situation? If that's true, and from what I know of recent Unisys and its culture, they're some of the worst example of change for the sake of change- just a horrific mess of people trying to cram in the latest and greatest, without anyone taking a moment and trying to figure out what is needed, how to best do it.
A few years ago I knew a couple of people who worked for Unisys, and they said the place is all very young people. Ahem.
Airlines would do better to contract with major financial transaction computing firms. THAT has to be mind-numbing. They, whoever they are, have designed their own specialized transaction processing chips! "Normal" IT stuff isn't fast nor reliable enough for them.
Yeah, the good MBAs know the "It ain't broke, don't fix it" mantra. Most MBA-types in more engineering companies think their profits come from constant change. Well, the short-term profits do, but long-term, well, keep your resume updated and out there.
My main point was supposed to be: use virurtotal and jotti before you believe _any_ specific antimalware software.
Another tidbit- when I'm very concerned, or scanning any computer that's unfamiliar to me, I'll pull the HD and scan it as a secondary (don't boot from it). There is malware that cleverly infects system files on shutdown, so when you boot, your OS image in RAM is infected. While booting said viruses copy an uninfected version of the system file back in, so scanners won't find it. But if you don't boot from that drive, you can find the virus in the infected system file.
Now if humans could put all that cleverness to solving cancer or some other thing...
(Score: 2) by turgid on Thursday December 29 2022, @11:28AM (1 child)
When I was an impatient teenager learning assembly language (Z80 and then 8086) I soon got very bored and frustrated. There was a lot I didn't know, particularly regarding code reuse. I had a good assembler for the Z80 which had macros. I'd played about with FORTH before, and I came to the conclusion that if I had to do anything remotely significant in assembly language in future, I'd look into writing my own FORTH-like system to get myself out of plain assembly language as soon as possible. I told you I was impatient!
How would you go about it? What tricks have you learned when writing in assembly language?
I refuse to engage in a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent [wikipedia.org].
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Thursday December 29 2022, @08:58PM
I did Z-80 assembly, only I had to assemble the machine code by hand, since afaik there was no assembler for the TS-1000. I was 30 then (1982). It was a challenge. But later with a multitasking machine (used IBM XT) there were a lot of things about assembly that were over my head, and it wasn't worth the effort to learn. I only learned Z-80 because BASIC was far too slow for a battle tanks game; with native machine code I had to add timing loops to slow it down! And this was a 1 mHz chip! It also only had 2k of RAM.
We only need fast machines these days because you kids... well... Facebook's incompetent coders can't even write HTML that renders properly on a nine inch Samsung Android running Firefox, and HTML is to assembly, well, it's hard to not screw up real programming. It's hard to screw up HTML so it won't render properly, unless your aim is to make it unreadable.
Impeach Donald Palpatine and his sidekick Elon Vader
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 28 2022, @09:10PM (2 children)
Key word: elected, and reelected, over and over, over 95% of them last time around. Let's complain less about elected officials, and concentrate more on the people who (re)elect them. Antipathy is a big motivator these days
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 30 2022, @05:47AM (1 child)
Antipathy yes, but I'd say that only voting for your own "team" is a much bigger effect.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 30 2022, @08:42PM
Same difference
(Score: 5, Touché) by choose another one on Wednesday December 28 2022, @11:01AM
TFS says TFA is:
[from] "the FBI"
[talks about] "legitimate brands, like cryptocurrency exchanges"
Yeah, right. Scam filter tripped right there.
(Score: 3, Informative) by MIRV888 on Wednesday December 28 2022, @08:35PM (1 child)
For Firefox, Adblock & NoScript seem to do the trick (for me).
NoScript is exactly what it says. It won't let anything run on a web page until you say so.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 28 2022, @11:32PM
uMatrix works for Firefox and clones on desktop and mobile. Icecat on mobile is better. Palemoon has a fork listed in the addons section of its website.
(Score: 3, Informative) by jasassin on Thursday December 29 2022, @03:13AM (3 children)
A pi-hole is cool. I have a Cudy X6 router running OpenWRT firmware (excellent!). I have installed the adblock service on it (basically like a pi-hole) and it works for all devices on the LAN. This means (and I find this quite hilarious and awesome) blocking ads on Roku channels (not all the channels, YouTube serves it's own ads and so do some others... Pluto etc.). I like watching Retro Crush (anime) channel and watching it go thwoops, spinning ball for 2 seconds, and back to the show. I just have to say "Tee Hee" out loud sometimes. It makes me sick to think of how much time I wasted before I got that set up.
Now that I think about it, I don't think I've ever bought something because of an advertisement I saw. Huh.
Is it just me, or are the ads for medication (tell your doctor about perexelcanshitovile) stupid? Like I'm gonna tell my doctor what I should be taking. WTF? Same with ads for F150's etc. Yeah, let me just sell my left nut here so I can get your F150 you dildo. What next? Ads for helicopters or hot air ballons? I probably shouldn't give them any ideas...
jasassin@gmail.com GPG Key ID: 0xE6462C68A9A3DB5A
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Thursday December 29 2022, @09:00PM (2 children)
Now that I think about it, I don't think I've ever bought something because of an advertisement I saw.
Maybe that's because you're not a drooling idiot.
Impeach Donald Palpatine and his sidekick Elon Vader
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Friday December 30 2022, @01:51AM (1 child)
I mean, not all advertisements are horrible. Just 99.99999999999999% of them. I may be off by a little, though.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 5, Interesting) by mcgrew on Friday December 30 2022, @08:17PM
I've figured out that they're written to sell only to the learning-impaired. No specs on the car they're selling, just show people doing things that would void the warranty and possibly get you arrested...
Impeach Donald Palpatine and his sidekick Elon Vader