Recent days I'm receiving multiple times the question
How can I detect when websites uses Browser Mining?
My answer was until yesterday evening: I don't know!
Recently community members discovered a Steemit tool making use of browser mining and since then I'm receiving the previously mentioned question.
When You Like To Know more about Browser Mining?
When You Like to Know how to protect yourself?
Read the remainder of this post!
One way of kinda learning if some website uses your browser to mine cryptocurrencies, is to look for anomalies in your CPU usage. This is not straight forward and also not very conclusive though. Possibly even, most of us don't really know how to check CPU usage (usually some statistic tool in your operating system), and even when checking CPU usage, it is difficult to tell if your browser is actually used for browser mining, since many things can eat CPU power. For instance, I have regularly 20+ tabs open in my Chrome and Safari browsers and that eats not only memory, but also CPU, at least when the websites are kinda active. Exchange and Trading websites that updates itself in realtime even crashes my laptop from time to time, and this has nothing to do with browser mining. So, although CPU usage can tell something, it is not the way to determine if browser mining is active. Better to get to some anti mining software (read below what I found, tested and use since yesterday evening).
But first a bit more about browser based mining...
Some articles on the Internet that explains what browser mining is, and why this may be good or bad, have a read; They are very informative...
- https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/could-cryptocurrency-kill-online-advertising-carl-whalley/
- https://www.extremetech.com/computing/257786-browser-cryptocurrency-mining-exploding-across-web
- https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2017/11/sneakier-more-persistent-drive-by-cryptomining-comes-to-a-browser-near-you/
My digging session for software to fight browser mining showed me the possibility to get a plugin for Google Chrome browser, to block mining in Chrome. Actually three plugins are in Chrome extension database when searching for 'anti mining' (URL: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/search/anti%20mining?hl=en-GB)
- Anti Miner
- No Mining
- MinerBlock
I generally like the plugins with the highest ratings and largest amount of voters, so I went for the number one in the list.
Installation is very easy, just click the button "add to chrome". After installation, the mining blocker is immediately active. I tested the blocker this with the Steemit tool that used browser mining, and indeed it worked. I could load the master website but from then on I could not get further into the specific features of the website since the blocker did not allow me to do so. I also tested the blocker with this specific website added to the whitelist of the blocker. Clicking the new icon in the top right of my Chrome browser, I got to the settings screen of the mining blocker where I could configure a whitelist of URLs. after adding the web service to the whitelist, I was able to use the website again in its entirety.
Super plugin and happy I finally made an effort to protect myself from unwanted and unasked mining through my browsers, taking away my CPU resources from other software I'm constantly running while I'm working on my laptop, slowing things down, and increasing my energy bill.
For those who like to know about other suggestions to block browser mining, have a read through this Internet article: