Publication Details

JShelter: Give Me My Browser Back

POLČÁK Libor, SALOŇ Marek, MAONE Giorgio, HRANICKÝ Radek and MCMAHON Michael. JShelter: Give Me My Browser Back. In: Proceedings of the 20th International Conference on Security and Cryptography. Řím: SciTePress - Science and Technology Publications, 2023, pp. 287-294. ISBN 978-989-758-666-8. Available from: https://arxiv.org/abs/2204.01392
Czech title
JShelter: vraťte mně můj prohlížeč
Type
conference paper
Language
english
Authors
Polčák Libor, Ing., Ph.D. (DIFS FIT BUT)
Saloň Marek, Ing. (FIT BUT)
Maone Giorgio (HACKADEMIX)
Hranický Radek, Ing., Ph.D. (DIFS FIT BUT)
McMahon Michael (FSF)
URL
Keywords

Browser Fingerprinting, Web Privacy, Web Security, Webextension APIs, JavaScript.

Abstract

The web is used daily by billions. Even so, users are not protected from many threats by default. This paper builds on previous web privacy and security research and introduces JShelter, a webextension that fights to return the browser to users. Moreover, we introduce a library helping with common webextension development tasks and fixing loopholes. JShelter focuses on fingerprinting prevention, limitations of rich web APIs, prevention of attacks connected to timing, and learning information about the device, the browser, the user, and the surrounding physical environment and location. During the research of sensor APIs, we discovered a loophole in the sensor timestamps that lets any page observe the device boot time if sensor APIs are enabled in Chromium-based browsers. JShelter provides a fingerprinting report and other feedback that can be used by future web privacy research. Thousands of users around the world use the webextension every day.

Published
2023
Pages
287-294
Proceedings
Proceedings of the 20th International Conference on Security and Cryptography
Conference
20th International Conference on Security and Cryptography, Řím, IT
ISBN
978-989-758-666-8
Publisher
SciTePress - Science and Technology Publications
Place
Řím, IT
DOI
10.5220/0011965600003555
UT WoS
001072829100024
EID Scopus
2-s2.0-85178640840
BibTeX 
@INPROCEEDINGS{FITPUB12716,
   author = "Libor Pol\v{c}\'{a}k and Marek Salo\v{n} and Giorgio Maone and Radek Hranick\'{y} and Michael McMahon",
   title = "JShelter: Give Me My Browser Back",
   pages = "287--294",
   booktitle = "Proceedings of the 20th International Conference on Security and Cryptography",
   year = 2023,
   location = "\v{R}\'{i}m, IT",
   publisher = "SciTePress - Science and Technology Publications",
   ISBN = "978-989-758-666-8",
   doi = "10.5220/0011965600003555",
   language = "english",
   url = "https://www.fit.vut.cz/research/publication/12716"
}
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