 |
| Report: Chrome extensions can pose a high security risk |
According to new research, Chrome web browser extensions, which are commonly used to extend functionality, pose a significant security risk.
Privacy firm Incognit recently released a report based on an analysis of 1,237 Google Chrome extensions available for download from the Chrome Web Store.
According to the report, nearly half (48.66%) of analytics extensions have a high or very high security risk, which means they are likely to store sensitive and identifiable data.
In its report, Incognito said that more than a quarter (27%) of extensions collect data, which is the company's biggest concern.
Of all the different plugins available for download, debugging and optimization plugins like Grammarly are the most data intensive. The percentage of typos and extensions that fetched at least one data type was about 79.5%. Additionally, these plugin types collected the most data types, with an average of 2.5 data types.
Incognito mode considers the Typing Correction and Enhancement plugin to be the most dangerous because it requires the most permissions. All this gives it one of the highest scores for the intensity of impact: 3.7 out of 5.
In addition to writing extensions, shopping category extensions also prove to be risky, with nearly two-thirds (64.9%) collecting user data. The average risk of these add-ons is around 3.9 out of 5, making them the most dangerous of all add-ons.
Since some extensions won't function properly without the proper permissions, including what Incogni calls terrible: clipboard reading and browsing data, it's important that every user chooses extensions from trusted developers. Actions are very important.
"A trusted developer is someone who has a reputation for developing problem-free software and has received many user reviews," Incognito researchers said.
It has also been said that even if a developer is trustworthy, users should be careful; It is easy to use bots to buy or manipulate reviews and ratings as the developer's intentions can change.