Google said it has removed more than 70 spyware-affected extensions from its official Chrome Web store. A decision made in response to an alert from computer security researchers at Awake Security, reports Reuters . This spy software has targeted Google’s Chrome browser with 32 million downloads of extensions.
These plug-ins seemed harmless, even beneficial. They were supposed to protect users from malicious sites when others had to convert file formats. But once installed, the extensions collected browsing history and user data. Given the number of downloads, this is the largest malicious plug-in deployment campaign, according to Gary Colomb, founder and chief scientist of Awake.
Israeli society singled out
It is by connecting at home on the Chrome browser that users transmitted information to many websites. A process that was stopped when the user used a corporate network, provided with security services, said Reuters . More than 15,000 linked areas were involved. All of these site names were acquired from Glacomm, based in Israel.
"Improve our automated and manual analyzes"
For its part, the company denies being linked to this spy operation. The Society for the Assignment of Internet Domain Names and Numbers (ICANN), which monitors registrars, said few complaints against Galcomm have been made in recent years. And none of them related to malware.
"When we were alerted to extensions in our web store violating our policy, we took action and used these incidents as training material to improve our automated and manual analyzes," said spokesperson Scott Westover. from Google.
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- Spying
- Cybersecurity
- Google chrome
- Internet
- High-Tech