The Latest Threat: Clickjacking
Technical news mags such as ZDnet report that clickjacking may be a serious threat that affects any Internet browser.
What is Clickjacking
In laymen’s terms, clickjacking happens when a malicious page is hiding behind what appears to be a safe webpage. When you click on an item, your computer is “clickjacked” by the malicious code, which then hijacks various components of your computer.This happens without your knowledge.
Generally, webcams are hijacked, but clickjacking is not limited to affecting a cam. For instance, your sound system or microphone can be exploited, or your PC can be taken over in other ways.
Adobe’s Flash Player was particularly vulnerable to clickjacking threats; however, Adobe has come out with a fix to address the issue.
What Browsers are Safe?
Clickjacking is a cross-browser malicious code, which affects virtually all Internet browsers. There is no quick fix, such as disabling javascript.
A “No Script” add-on that works with Firefox is the only known solution.
Problems with the Clickjacking Fix
After using No Script for a week or so, I disabled it because it made web surfing a chore. Every site that I visited was blocked to some degree or another because the site contained YouTube videos, ads or javascript coding. For instance, the following were all blocked by No Script:
- Google Analytics
- Pepperjam network
- Peelaway Ads
- Voxant’s newsroom
- Chitika
- and many, many more (see the partial list of affiliate programs and other utilities blocked by No Script).
One of the few ad networks automatically whitelisted by the No Script add-on is Google’s Adsense. Most of the others will need to be manually approved, and it is unlikely that the average Internet user will know that an ad is safe enough to whitelist.
If clickjacking is truly the threat that some would say that it is, and if solutions such as No Script are the only way to fight back, I can see that this situation will kill online advertising. Adserver Plus, Doubleclick and other big ad networks were blocked by the No Script add-on.
Conclusion: Maybe the Threat is Overrated
My web browsing experience is back up to speed since I’ve disabled No Script and so far I haven’t been hit by any type of clickjacking activities. It is possible that the threat is not as bad as some would claim.
The NotGuru blog has posted some videos that show exactly how clickjacking works and how to install fixes.