JSON formatter Chrome plugin now closed and injecting adware

jkl5xx

Noticed a suspicious element called give-freely-root-bcjindcccaagfpapjjmafapmmgkkhgoa in the chrome inspector today. Turns out about a month ago, the popular open source [JSON Formatter chrome extension]( https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/json-formatter/bcji... ) went closed source and started injecting adware into checkout pages. Also seems to be doing some geolocation tracking. I didn't see this come up on hn, so I figured I'd sound the alarm for all the privacy-conscious folks here. At this point, I feel like browser extension marketplaces are a failed experiment. I can just vibecode my own json pretty-printer extension and never deal with this problem again.

nightpool

The same thing happened to ModHeader https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/modheader-modify-ht... -- they started adding ads to every google search results page I loaded, linking to their own ad network. Took me weeks to figure out what was going on. I uninstalled it immediately and sent a report to Google, but the extension is still up and is still getting 1 star reviews.

gsibble

Is it me or is this happening more and more frequently?

tadfisher

WebExtension permissions are fucking broken if the set of permissions necessary to reformat and style JSON snippets is sufficient to inject network-capable Javascript code into any page. If basically any worthwhile extension can be silently updated to inject <script> tags anywhere, then it's time to call this a failed experiment and move on. Bake UBlock and password-management APIs into the browser. Stop the madness.

computerfriend

Interesting that the author, Callum Locke, seems to be a real person with a real reputation to damage. Previously this would have been a trust signal to me, I figured real developers would be less likely to go rogue given the consequences.

captn3m0

The JSONView extension on Firefox was targeted a while ago. (2017?) I only found out because Mozilla forced an uninstall with a warning and then I had to go down Bugzilla to find the impact (it leaked browser visit URLs).

jansommer

Guy talks about switching to the "Classic" version if > you just want a simple, open source, local-only JSON-formatting extension that won't receive updates. Wow that sounds like a tough choice. JSON formatting is moving at such a fast pase that I don't know if I should pay a JSON formatting SaaS a monthly subscription, or if I really can live without updates.

jmuguy

I actively try to get coworkers to audit, remove and work without browser extensions. Google and Firefox clearly do not care to spend even a modicum of effort to police their marketplaces. There's only a few I would trust and assume all others to be malware now or at some point in the future.

binaryturtle

I guess you really need to unpack each and every extensions before installation and carefully inspect the code manually to see if it only would be doing what the extensions is advertising. Darn… and I thought that the JSLibCache extension was forcing every site into UTF-8 mode (even those that need to run with a legacy codepage) was a critical issue. A problem I encountered yesterday… took me a while to figure out too.

wesbos

I noticed this a week ago. Ended up building my own that has all the features I love from using several over the years. https://github.com/wesbos/JSON-Alexander

nip

I was approached twice to add « a search and tracking script » to my 35k+ user-based extension. Now I know what would have happened if I had accepted.

jimrandomh

I think the main problem here is the ideology of software updating. Updates represent a tradeoff: On one hand there might be security vulnerabilities that need an update to fix, and developers don't want to receive bug reports or maintain server infrastructure for obsolete versions. On the other hand, the developer might make decisions users don't want, or turn even temporarily (as in a supply chain attack) or permanently (as in selling off control of a browser extension). In the case of small browser extensions from individual developers, I think the tradeoff is such that you should basically never allow auto-updating. Unfortunately Google runs a Chrome extension marketplace that doesn't work that way, and worse, Google's other business gives them an ideology that doesn't let them recognize that turning into adware is a transgression that should lead to being kicked out of their store. I think that other than a small number of high-visibility long-established extensions, you should basically never install anything from there, and if you want a browser extension you should download its source code and install it locally as an unpacked extension. (Firefox's extension marketplace is less bad, but tragically, Firefox doesn't allow you to bypass its marketplace and load extensions that you build from source yourself.)

roozbeh18

last night I got an alert from Malwarebytes on my machine that it quarntined an extension. Quarantined - PUP.Optional.Hijacker. C:\USERS*\APPDATA\LOCAL\GOOGLE\CHROME\USER DATA\DEFAULT\EXTENSIONS\BCJINDCCCAAGFPAPJJMAFAPMMGKKHGOA wondered what the extension was... JSON Formatter

pfg_

Firefox has this ability by default and I find it very useful. And it will never get sold to some random person to be replaced with adware.

drunkendog

From the author on HN a couple years ago: > FWIW, and since a few of you probably use it… I own the JSON Formatter extension [0], which I created and open-sourced 12 years ago and have maintained [1] ever since, with 2 million users today. And I solemnly swear that I will never add any code that sends any data anywhere, nor let it fall into the hands of anyone else who would. I’ve been emailed several tempting cash offers from shady people who presumably want to steal everyone’s data or worse. I sometimes wish I had never put my name on it so I could just take the money without harming my reputation, but I did, so I’m stuck with being honourable. On the plus side I will always be able to say that I never sold out. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37067908

hybirdss

just went through all my github actions and pinned them to commit SHAs after reading this. same problem — if someone pushes to @main your CI blindly runs it. auto-update anything is basically handing someone a key to your house and hoping they stay nice forever

pnw

They responded on the Chrome store. Hey William, thanks for flagging this! We were experimenting with analytics to help us identify crashes and improve stability. We've rolled this back in v2.1.17, which is now live and being rolled out. Going forward, we'll ensure any analytics collection is clearly disclosed. Thanks again! https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/json-formatter/gpmo...

starkeeper

It is closed source because they think people want to buy this? Isn't this just built in to Firefox and Chrome now? I mean chrome already lets you preview API calls with pretty print. I'm confused why this extension still exists I guess, and definitely too spooked out to even bother looking.

ggregoire

It's quite remarkable that a chrome extension can just update overnight and start injecting adware (or worse) and not a single warning from chrome. I shouldn't have to read hackernews to find out.

wnevets

Google spent all that time pushing Manifest V3 but does little to prevent this, and in some cases even encourages it. [1] > To provide a more tangible example, Chrome Web Store currently has Blaze VPN, Safum VPN and Snap VPN extensions carry the “Featured” badge. These extensions (along with Ishaan VPN which has barely any users) belong to the PDF Toolbox cluster which produced malicious extensions in the past. A cursory code inspection reveals that all four are identical and in fact clones of Nucleus VPN which was removed from Chrome Web Store in 2021. And they also don’t even work, no connections succeed. The extension not working is something users of Nucleus VPN complained about already, a fact that the extension compensated with fake reviews. [1] https://palant.info/2025/01/13/chrome-web-store-is-a-mess/