and there is currently no defense against it.
Don't load ads. There, problem solved.
this post was submitted on 27 Sep 2023
227 points (96.3% liked)
Technology
70528 readers
3839 users here now
This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
Our Rules
- Follow the lemmy.world rules.
- Only tech related news or articles.
- Be excellent to each other!
- Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
- Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
- Politics threads may be removed.
- No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
- Only approved bots from the list below, this includes using AI responses and summaries. To ask if your bot can be added please contact a mod.
- Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed
- Accounts 7 days and younger will have their posts automatically removed.
Approved Bots
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
The FBI recommends using an ad blocker for precisely this reason.
Defense against it
- uBlock Origin
- NextDNS (I highly recommend this to everyone because you can easily get it for mobile devices and block ads served over mobile networks)
- PiHole
- Plenty of other options
But if corporate media reported on ways to block ads, it'd eat into their own bottom line, so I can understand their choice to skirt the whole "ads are blockable with some level of effort" conversation.
I've been blocking online ads for nearly the entirety of my multi-decade usage of the internet, to the point where seeing them now is actually quite jarring. The fact that they're now a prime vector for malware and spyware/capitalist surveillance just one-ups the decision to block them just for the annoyance factor.
Are we back in 1995? This should be common knowledge.
Blocking ads to avoid their malware was the #1 reason to have adblocker.
load more comments
(19 replies)
Yea, that's not new. Malware in ads has been around for like a decade. None of the major ad providers have given zero fucks about it so an ad blocker is mandatory and with Google trying to make ad blocking harder to impossible it's only a matter of time until some major issues with this malware happens.
But now they being used for targeting devices by Spyware! Another reason to hate ads.
AdGuard DNS for android :)
Yes! And ublock origin on Firefox. And I use newpipe with sponsor block for youtube. Not seen an ad in ages. Ads are a cybersecurity threat no doubt.
For YouTube, I use ReVanced Extended, it has Sponsor Block, Return Dislikes Back and an Ad Block. (Btw it's a fork of a fork)
Honestly, setting up revanced seems a little too much work to me. So I use newpipe which I find much easier to set up.
Did you trying using the default patches?
Fact is, I am lazy. Reading the long list of things to do to patch the app and to keep it updated put me off so I didn't try.
People read the list???
Yes, I read the instructions for patching the app.
Oh, I thought the patches list
And still websites are pissed that I block ads. Websites, the adblocker is not there to annoy you, it is there to protect me from your foolishness and lazyness when it comes to weed out bad actors.
And when websites demand I turn off the adblocker, I just close it.
Unity also purchased a company last year that was notorious for turning a blind eye to malvertisers
~~This is using some vulnerability in iOS. I'm an Android and Linux guy, but let's hope Apple quickly finds the bug and fixes it.~~ And fuck that agency for not alerting Apple and instead profiting from it. And fuck the Israeli government for enabling them.
Edit: I misread, supposedly this is miraculously able to target every device.
From the article:
What sets Insanet’s Sherlock apart from Pegasus is its exploitation of ad networks rather than vulnerabilities in phones. A Sherlock user creates an ad campaign that narrowly focuses on the target’s demographic and location, and places a spyware-laden ad with an ad exchange. Once the ad is served to a web page that the target views, the spyware is secretly installed on the target’s phone or computer.
If they're using ads on a web page to install spyware, then they're most definitely exploiting vulnerabilities—unless they're showing the user a 'do you want to install XYZ?', in which case this isn't newsworthy at all. Ads aren't some magical thing that can just go around installing shit silently, so I don't know wtf the article is going on about, but it doesn't make sense.
Edit: The Register seems to have a more sensible take on it: https://www.theregister.com/2023/09/16/insanet_spyware/
Even better: Thanks to ad tracking you can show specific malware to a specific cohort of people. Want to get spyware on every computer in DC? Just sign up for our ad program!