An investigative report reveals that new spyware can slip in unseen through online ads—and there is currently no defense against it. So not only that online ads are intrusive and can infect devices through malware, they can also be used for spying.

  • teft@startrek.website
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    89
    ·
    edit-2
    1 year ago

    and there is currently no defense against it.

    Don’t load ads. There, problem solved.

          • aceshigh@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            3
            arrow-down
            1
            ·
            1 year ago

            it’s scary for people who don’t understand it. i would never ask my parents to get it because i know that any errors or whatever their computer will get will get blamed on the extension and get blamed on me.

            • Dagrothus@reddthat.com
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              6
              ·
              1 year ago

              You wouldn’t ask your boomer parents to block ads that will likely get them to install viruses or get scammed? They are easily the demographic that would benefit the most from ublock.

              • PM_Your_Nudes_Please@lemmy.world
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                7
                ·
                edit-2
                1 year ago

                You’ve clearly never had to deal with the “you touched my computer 3 years ago and now it won’t turn on. Why did you break my computer” family members. One of the number one pieces of advice for people just starting in IT is to never work on family members’ computers. Because as soon as you agree to fix something, you’re now the person to blame when something stops working. Because “it worked fine the last time you touched it, and now it’s broken. Clearly I didn’t do anything to break it, so it must have been you” is a scarily common train of thought.

                • Drbreen@sh.itjust.works
                  link
                  fedilink
                  English
                  arrow-up
                  1
                  arrow-down
                  1
                  ·
                  edit-2
                  1 year ago

                  This and don’t ever tell co-workers your into computers either. They will ask for say, laptop recommdations. So because you like them, you do a little research and send them some links. 6 months later they’ll come back asking for another recommendation because they didn’t buy anything when they last asked! This has happened to me more times than I care to think about. Totally annoys me.

          • Bebo@literature.cafeOP
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            1
            ·
            1 year ago

            Thing is most people are unaware of the harmful nature of ads and don’t care to do anything to block them.

      • micka190@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        11
        ·
        1 year ago

        And then 9% out of that remaining 10% just can’t be bothered to install them for some insane reason.

      • MrFlamey@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        2
        ·
        1 year ago

        I think I heard that usage on desktop is something like 1 in 4, which is pretty good. Mobile is another world altogether, since it requires different browsers that support adblocking and then accessing websites through the browser instead of the app for the website, which many users would definitely prefer to use.