Security News > 2021 > January > Facebook sues makers of malicious Chrome extensions for scraping data
Facebook has taken legal action against the makers of malicious Chrome extensions used for scraping user-profiles and other information from Facebook's website and from users' systems without authorization.
After being installed on the users' computers, these Chrome extensions also installed malicious code in the background which allowed the defendants to scrape user data from Facebook's site.
The malicious Chrome add-ons were also used to surreptitiously collect data unrelated to Facebook from the users' web browsers.
While the users were browsing the Facebook website, the extensions automatically scraped account information including the victims' name, user ID, gender, relationship status, and age group among others.
"We are seeking a permanent injunction against defendants and demanding that they delete all Facebook data in their possession," Romero concluded.
In March 2020, Facebook sued domain name registrar Namecheap and its proxy service Whoisguard "For registering domain names that aim to deceive people by pretending to be affiliated with Facebook apps" and often being used "For phishing, fraud and scams."