App of the Week – Suspicious Site Reporter

Published On June 25, 2019 | By Tom Huskerson | App of the Week

Cyber security is sort of a civic duty. If you are using the Internet do somebody a favor and let them know when you smell a rat. Thats why Suspicion Site Reporter is the App of the Week.

Let me correct myself, this week’s app is actually a Google Chrome extension.

Google has launched a new Chrome extension that lets you sound the alarm on suspicious websites for inclusion in the company’s Safe Browsing index. The index is used by Google Chrome and a number of third-party browsers that include Safari, Firefox and Vivaldi and GNOME web browsers. This makes it especially useful.

As an added bonus Google is also providing a new warning in Chrome that stops you before you visit one of the millions of criminal websites. Many of these sites appear legitimate but are actually looking for victims to trick into giving up their credentials or download malware.

The Safe Browsing tool normally cruises the web looking for these suspicious sites. But Chrome’s new extension lets you help out if you come across a suspicious site first.

Reporting funky websites is a simple process and the extension even lets you include screenshots if you so choose, the referrer chain that got you to the site in the first place and the DOM content of your browser. It’s your choice which one of these to send and the screenshot option is off by default.

Your browser bar will get a flag that will change color based on how legitimate it judges the website to be. The flag will turn orange for any site that isn’t a top 5,000 site. This should cause you to at least think before clicking on the site. There are plenty of websites people visit that are not in the top 5,000.

As for the new warning in Chrome 75, Google points out that its purpose is block you from visiting websites sites that try to trick you with deceptive URLs that look like, and seem legit, but certainly are not. This is known as typosquatting. If you land on one of those websites Chrome will hit you with a full-screen roadblock warning you to turn back or face the consequences.

According to the Google team, “This new warning works by comparing the URL of the page you’re currently on to URLs of pages you’ve recently visited. If the URL looks similar, and might cause you to be confused or deceived, we’ll show a warning that helps you get back to safety.”

We could all use a little help staying safe online. And if you could keep someone from getting robbed wouldn’t you?

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About The Author

Tom Huskerson Bio Born in Richmond Virginia Tom Huskerson is a military veteran who settled in California after his discharge. Tom attended Santa Barbara City College where he began his writing career as a campus reporter. He worked as an intern news reporter for the Santa Barbara News-Press writing feature stories before moving on to San Francisco. At San Francisco State University Tom studied broadcast communications and began to focus on the Internet. He completed his graduate thesis on Internet advertising. Tom was the first student to ever focus on the Internet as a graduate student at San Francisco State University. After graduation he went to work for Zona Research in California’s Silicone Valley. As a research associate Tom supported senior analyst writing on the latest developments in the Internet industry. During the dot com boom Tom worked for several web businesses as a market researcher and analyst. As a writer and researcher Tom has authored various technical works including a training program for Charles Schwab security. Other projects included professional presentations on workplace violence and hiring security contractors. Tom has also written both fiction and non-fiction works and blogging for a travel website. He has published two books of short stories and completed two novels. Tom is the owner of Scribe of Life Literature and EbonyCandle.com. Tom is not the chief editor for the OnTechStreet. com. A news and information blog that focuses on tech news for African-Americans. The blog is the result of his desire to inform the African American community of the dangers and benefits of the cyber age. In his blog Tom reports on information security, new and analysis, scams and hoaxes, legal happenings and various topics that arise from the age of information. Tom believes that technology is a necessary tool for black people and they should know what is happening. Tom writes believing that techno speak is for the professional and that valuable information can be communicated using plain language. As a result he has embraced the motto, Less Tech, More Knowledge.

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