What Gives With Wot?

faster · Jan 27, 2017

I've used Web of Trust a long time, and found it comforting to get evaluations of sites before clicking on them.

Now, my Firefox won't install it, unless I accept that it might damage my PC. The reason is that it hasn't been reviewed by Mozilla. I have the latest Firefox.

It's been several months, yet Mozilla still hasn't verified it. I assume they found something bad in this add-on. I can't find out on their community site.

I'd like to assume the people here have learned what the problem is. I would like to reinstall WOT, but I hesitate in case something bad turned up.

What do you know about it? I can't be the only one with this problem.

LauraR · Jan 27, 2017

Hi...it looks like they were collecting information from people who used it:
http://news.thewindowsclub.com/web-of-trust-wot-add-on-taken-down-86981/

WOT is one of the most trusted and popular add-ons used by millions of users worldwide to check the safety ratings of the websites. German news site recently reported that the add-on is malicious and can remotely execute the arbitrary commands on any web page browsed by the users including privileged browser pages.

While WOT hands over the users’ data in an anonymized form, it can be severely critical. As per the analysis reported by Rob, Security Technology student and AMO editor working on Firefox WebExtensions, WOT can also steal the banking credentials of the users besides installing a malware in their system.

Downloaded for more than 140 million times, the extension WOT collects and sells the information like user ID, web address, location, time and date.
Click to expand...

http://www.ghacks.net/2016/11/05/mozilla-and-google-remove-wot-extension/

faster · Jan 27, 2017

All I learned was that there seem to be two sides to this story, and that politics is involved.
So I'll wait to see what WOT does to make itself less of a privacy/security risk.
Thanks!

Eldon · Jan 27, 2017

It's not just Mozilla Firefox but also Google Chrome & Opera that have removed the 'stealing and selling private data' add-on.
WOT then decided to be 'Mr Nice Guy'...

Even after providing your consent to this Privacy Policy, you are entitled to change your mind. If you do, you may opt out of the data collection and sharing process related to your WOT app or extension, by changing the options selected in the “Settings” menu, so that the “Real-time Protection” option is set to “Off”. After you opt out, we will no longer collect and share your data in connection with your use of the WOT app or extension.
Click to expand...

https://www.mywot.com/en/privacy/privacy_policy
WOT conveniently forgot to mention the extension is useless with Real-time Protection set to Off.

Anon-469e6fb48c · Jan 27, 2017

Look's like some thing i would not trust.

If any thing it probably has a PUP attached to it.

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What Gives With Wot?

faster Private E-2

LauraR MajorGeeks Super-Duper Administrator Staff Member

faster Private E-2

Eldon Major Geek Extraordinaire

Anon-469e6fb48c Anonymized