Computer security extension for browsers - Ghostery. Ghostery - a plugin for protecting user's confidential information on the Internet What are the bugs in Yandex
is a browser plugin that allows you to provide anonymity on the Internet. To understand the main functions of this plugin, let's install it in the browser. The plugin supports the main popular browsers ( Chrome, Opera, Mozila), but on Internet Explorer it is not supported. There are alternatives for this browser.Installation
basic settings
After installation, an icon with a ghost will appear in the upper right corner, this is the installed plugin. Click on it and then on the settings button.
When entering the settings, be sure to enable the Ghostrank mode. This mode allows you to find new bugs on sites. If the plugin finds it, then it sends bugs to the developers' server and they check them. This is necessary to replenish the base. By the way, I recommend including automatic update. This line is below. Now you will have the most current version, which blocks the maximum number of bugs. Next comes the blocking mode. You need to decide what a bug is.
A bug is a script that runs when you visit a website. They are divided into categories:
Analytics - bugs used to collect statistics. They determine the user's visit to the site, browser type, location. These are the most harmless bugs, they simply record statistics so that site admins can know their traffic;
Privacy is the collection of information based on your interests. For example, you entered the search query "tours to Egypt" to find out the price, after which tours to Egypt will be offered on sites where there is advertising. Everything is simple;
Beacons - determine user behavior on the site. Which links are most often clicked on, which buttons are clicked, and the like;
The program settings mention the white list. This list, which includes site exclusions, they will not be blocked.
An easy way to block all bugs and ads on every site. Go to the plugin settings and click "select all" and save. The screenshot shows the whole process. If you don’t want to block everyone, then uncheck a certain category, for example, the “analytics” category is absolutely harmless.
Today, the security of personal data of millions of users seems to be one of the main problems of modern browsers. In this regard, the Yandex browser seems to be the best solution, since, despite the absence of any intelligible protection, it provides users with the opportunity to expand existing functionality through, including those related to computer security.
Ghostery for Yandex.Browser
Surely, many have come across a situation where advertising from Google or Yandex somehow recommends suitable goods and services, although the user did not indicate any clarifying information about himself. Such a case is a fairly clear consequence of the work of the so-called bugs, which are located on the vast majority of portals.
Ghostery for Yandex browser is a special application designed to protect users of both PC and mobile platforms from unauthorized use of their personal data. The principle of the extension is extremely simple: it blocks bugs, which leads to a complete cessation of information leakage towards the site owner.
IMPORTANT! As foreign practice shows, personal data of users and trade in them seems to be a fairly successful and rapidly growing business, which is gaining momentum in our country.
This application is indispensable for those who take a responsible approach to the issue of security on the Internet, therefore, it is advisable to analyze its main features and functions.
Application Features
This application is significantly different from its similar counterparts, like. After all, the latter work mainly based on updated filters, while Gosteri blocks all possible threats in advance, giving the user the opportunity to decide which of the widgets and bugs to allow and which to leave blocked.
Among the interesting features of the program, it is worth mentioning:
- Convenient sorting of bugs by purpose and function;
- The ability to add a site to the white list, which will restore its full functionality;
- The ability to disable and enable individual bugs, which allows for a flexible privacy policy.
ADVICE! You should not think that extensions, even the most functional ones, can completely protect users' personal data. To ensure perfect protection, you will need to use a whole range of measures, including vpn and a special browser.
Installing and using the extension
In order to expand the functionality of the browser and block bugs on sites, you will need to go to the Google app store, which presents the official page of the program. Despite the fact that the version presented in the service is intended for Chrome browsers, the Yandex analogue supports its installation, as it was created on its basis.
In order for the download to start, you will need to press the appropriate key, after which the program will ask the user to confirm the action. After that, the download will begin, which can take a long time if the Internet is slow.
After the download is complete, the browser will again ask for permission to install, after which you will have to wait for the installation of the application to complete. Then you need to go to the browser settings, select Add-ons and find the installed Gosteri. It will need to be turned on by pressing the appropriate key.
Now, after loading each page, in the upper corner, next to the extension icon, the number of items stopped will be displayed.
Video to help
Ghostery is free because some of our users anonymously and voluntarily opt-in to share data with us about the sites and trackers the extension encounters.
If you choose to share tracker data with us, this is how it would work:
- As you visit a site, Ghostery identifies and collects data regarding the site and its trackers.
- Ghostery uses this data to improve our products to create a cleaner, faster, and safer web.
The more users that join the Human Web, the better it gets for everyone. Would you like to participate?
What data does Ghostery collect?
If you opt-in to share your data, Ghostery collects the following information:
- Trackers identified by the Ghostery Browser Extension
- Blocking status of the trackers
- Domains identified as serving trackers
- Time it takes for the page and trackers to load
- Trackers" position on the page
- Browser in which the Ghostery Browser Extension has been installed
- Browser language
- Standard web server log information (i.e. web request)
- Data sent in response to that request
- Timestamp for the request page
- Tracker weight (megabytes of data attribute to each tracker)
- Tracker appearance on any visited webpage
To learn more about our information practices see our Privacy Statement.
Learn More
The Human Web is built using world-leading privacy-by-design practices that ensures that any data that is collected is done completely anonymously without any personally identifiable information. To achieve this, the Human Web implements two core components: its data collection framework and its proxy network.
The Human Web data collection framework requires that the data points contributed by users are evaluated only as a single, aggregated event, disentangling these signals from any personally-identifiable information such as timestamps or user IDS. Furthermore, The Human Web filters out any sensitive or personal information from URLs that are considered unsafe (e.g., twitter.com/username) that can be used to identify an individual person. Thus, we are neither able to combine data from multiple entries or multiple visits to websites, nor to link this information with any personal information, like email addresses or user IDs, that can be used to identify an individual.
As a further safety precaution, this information is sent through the Human Web proxy network, a series of peer-to-peer proxies that remove information like the user IP addresses, making it virtually impossible to determine who or where the data comes from. The proxy network itself is blind to the content of the data its sending, adding a further security measure to the process. consequently, all data we collect is virtually unidentifiable by anyone, including ourselves, so that even if our security were breached by a hacker or outside organization, there would be absolutely no way to tie this information to individuals.
The specific data contributed through the Human Web includes:
- Non-Private URLs
- Search queries along with Search Engine Results Pages
- Suspicious URLs that are potential phishing websites
- Information related to safe and unsafe trackers
- Information related to the prevalence and performance of trackers
In this video, we will look at a browser extension called Ghostery, which allows you to provide the basics of anonymity on the Internet. But in order to more clearly understand what kind of anonymity we are talking about, we will install this extension and, in the course of studying its work, we will consider various systems for tracking user activity.
I will consider the operation of Ghostery in the browser Google Chrome, however this extension also works in Mozilla Firefox and Opera, but is not supported by Internet Explorer. Therefore, for Internet Explorer, consider alternative options.
And so, let's get started, to install this extension, go to ( Menu \ Settings \ Extensions \ View gallery \Ghostery\ Install). To the right of the address bar, we have a ghost icon, this icon will display the activity of the program.
Now let's move on to the program settings ( Ghostery\ Settings \ Settings):
Data collection - when the Ghostrank function is enabled, when unknown web bugs or sites appear, this data will be sent to the program server to replenish the database;
Auto-update - automatic update of information about new bugs;
Blocking - here we specify which bugs to block and which not. In general, the web bug itself is a script that runs on the site when you visit it or perform certain actions, and in the program they are divided into the following categories:
1) Analytics- bugs that are designed to collect statistics. They send information such as the number of visitors, their browser types, country, region, etc.
3) Confidentiality– collecting information based on your interests. To make it easier to understand, imagine the following situation, perhaps it happened to you. We went to the website of the online store to ask how much watches cost on the Internet, so for the sake of interest. As a result, you found out the information you needed and went to the news site. There is a teaser ad on the news site, i.e. advertising with an image and a small description, which has already got everyone. And after a while you notice that you are given an advertisement for watches, go to another site, the same thing. Those. watch ads start following you all over the internet.
In this situation, the web bug transmitted information about the topic that you were interested in, and the service, in conjunction with teaser networks, began to flood you with similar offers in order to sell the product.
4) lighthouses- tracking user activity. This is how many times a particular link was clicked, etc.
You can whitelist a list of sites for which Ghostery will not block bugs, but this is easier to do while the program is running than to manually fill in the necessary sites.
Let's block all the bugs by clicking on the button ( Select All \ Save) and try to go to some site, let's say fimlix.net video hosting site. The pop-up notification displays which bugs the program has found and which ones are blocked. Since we indicated the blocking of all known bugs, the program blocked everything it found.
By clicking on the ghost icon, a window appears with more detailed description blocked web bugs. Here we can disable or enable certain bugs completely or for certain sites, pause the block or add the site to the white list.
Actually, that's the whole work of the program. To install this extension for Mozilla Firefox ( Menu \ Add-ons \ Search for add-ons \Ghostery), for Opera ( Opera\ Extensions \ View gallery of extensions \ Search for add-ons \Ghostery\ Add toOpera)
But again, as I said, this program is not supported by Internet Explorer, so we will use a different method in it, this is adding tracking lists (Menu \ Customize add-ons \ Tracking protection \ Get a tracking protection list from the Internet \ Add all lists ). In Internet Explorer, the block is displayed in blue before the refresh icon, as you can see, these lists also do a good job with advertising. The only negative is that detailed information about what is found and what is blocked is not displayed.
The Ghostery extension for Chrome prevents advertisers, social media, and other online services from collecting and storing your online surfing and shopping habits.
Ghostery is a small but powerful extension that gives you more control of your online privacy and therefore makes browsing the web safer. It has an easy to view and understand design and color scheme. The extension will alert you with a bubble that is slightly transparent and blends well with the webpage you are on, so as not to be interrupted.
In testing, Ghostery performed very well and notified us about numerous trackers scripts, images, and objects, from these it allowed us to select which to block. Ghostery is well configured and trackers which are blocked from from one website are then blocked from all.
Although Ghostery blocks links very well, this has the tendency to sometimes results in certain websites becoming not view-able. If this happens you may have to test each blocked tracker individually to ascertain what has caused the issue, and this obviously can take time. Overall, the Ghostery extension for Chrome provides a high quality security service that gives you good control over your browsing.
