Popular Google Chrome Extension Hacked To Covertly Mine Cryptocurrency
If you are a user of the popular Google Chrome extension "Archive Poster" you need to be aware that the extension has been misbehaving lately. Currently "Archive Poster" has over 105,000 users and has in recent weeks turned into an in-browser cryptocurrency miner.
The extension isn't asking permission to hijack the CPU of user computers to mine Monero cryptocurrency. Monero has been the cryptocurrency that many nefarious users are choosing to mine with the stolen processing power of unsuspecting computer users. Facebook Messenger was attacked recently to mine Monero using Digimine malware.
A report from back in October said that there are over a billion PCs globally that are unsuspectingly running cryptocurrency mining software in the background, with many of those machines mining Monero. The hijacking of browsers to mine digital monies is so prevalent that Opera 50 launched a new feature specifically to stop in-browser Monero cryptojacking.
With the Archive Poster hijacking, Monero is mined the entire time the browser is open. For those unfamiliar with the extension, it is a made for Tumblr and allows a user to more easily reblog, queue, draft, and like pots from another user's blog archive. The hijacking began at the beginning of December according to reports and users Coinhive embedded in the source code.
Despite the poor reviews and warnings given in reviews about the cryptojacking, Google has yet to do anything about the extension. Currently there has been no official statement from the developer of Archive Poster on if this was intentional or not.
