- The report claims that LinkedIn scans browsers for extensions
- Claim data used against competitors in “BrowserGate”
- LinkedIn denies abuse, calls allegations a smear campaign
A new report claims that LinkedIn uses hidden JavaScript to scan its visitors’ browsers for installed extensions, look for ones that compete with its own sales tools, and then twist its users’ arms until they stop using them and choose LinkedIn’s products instead.
But the social network says this is a smear campaign run by a disgruntled extension developer who lost a court case in Germany.
An “association of commercial LinkedIn users” called Fairlinked eV released a report detailing “BrowserGate” — claiming that LinkedIn scans for thousands of browser extensions and ties the results to identifiable user profiles — and by scanning, LinkedIn harvests personal and company information.
The article continues below
Scans confirmed, motive not
“LinkedIn scans for over 200 products that directly compete with its own sales tools, including Apollo, Lusha and ZoomInfo. Because LinkedIn knows each user’s employer, it can map which companies are using which competing products. It is extracting the customer lists of thousands of software companies from their users’ browsers without anyone’s knowledge,” the report said.
“Then it uses what it finds. LinkedIn has already sent enforcement threats to users of third-party tools using data obtained through this hidden scan to identify its targets.”
Apparently the scanning part is true – Bleeping Computer ran an independent test and saw a JavaScript that checked for exactly 6,236 browser extensions. The publication says many of the extensions scanned are related to LinkedIn, but some have seemingly unrelated features — language and grammar extensions, tools for tax professionals and others.
“The script also collects a wide range of browser and device data, including CPU core count, available memory, screen resolution, time zone, language settings, battery status, audio information, and storage capabilities.” Bleeping Computer reports.
In response to the allegations, LinkedIn says it scans for extensions, but does so to prevent users from violating the site’s terms of use. It also claims that BrowserGate’s author is running a smear campaign after losing a court battle in Germany.
Do you protect user privacy? Or does it violate?
“The claims on the website linked here are patently false. The person behind them is subject to an account restriction for scraping and other violations of LinkedIn’s Terms of Service,” LinkedIn’s response said.
“To protect our members’ privacy, their data, and to ensure site stability, we look for extensions that scrape data without members’ consent or otherwise violate LinkedIn’s Terms of Service.
Here’s why: some extensions have static resources (images, javascript) available to insert into our web pages. We can detect the presence of these extensions by checking if the static resource URL exists. This record is visible inside the Chrome Developer Console. We use this data to determine which extensions violate our terms, to inform and improve our technical defenses, and to understand why one member account may be retrieving a disproportionate amount of other members’ data, which on a large scale affects the stability of the site. We do not use this data to derive sensitive information about members.
In retaliation for this website owner’s account restriction, they, as an additional context, tried to obtain a ban in Germany, alleging that LinkedIn had violated various laws. The court ruled against them, finding that their claims against LinkedIn had no merit and, in fact, that person’s own data practices were in violation of the law.
Unfortunately, this is a case about someone who lost in court but is seeking a new trial in the court of public opinion without regard for accuracy.”
Apparently, BrowserGate’s author built a browser extension called “Teamfluence,” which, according to LinkedIn, violated the site’s terms of use for automated data collection.
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