Researcher’s Footnote: Common Browser Addons Causing .gov Website Login Problems.
I’m reporting on a well-known issue found while troubleshooting in a setting I’m sure many other computer technicians have found themselves facing: their parent’s IT problems.
Specifically, addons for coupons, bonuses and so on are known to cause problems since they have in the adware days of mid 2000’s. It seems little has changed as the well-known plugin Survey Junkie Pulse [Survey Junkie Pulse — Microsoft Edge Addons] is blocking access to the US Social Security Administration’s website; https://ssa.gov/.
The following error is displayed when trying to log in.
This is caused by how the extension tries to look at web traffic. Because the addon is looking at a website that contains sensitive personal information, and on a .gov top level domain, information cannot be securely transmitted. This causes the page to display the error message as an error handled on the SSA site itself. This issue is documented on reddit affecting a larger number of websites. [A warning for those who do the Survey Junkie browser extension offer for 114 SB : SwagBucks (reddit.com)]
It’s well known that browser extensions can over-scope on permissions and this one is no different. Having reached out to both groups with this blog, I’m confident that survey junkie would make the necessary changes to exclude .gov websites from their program and remove the problem from their app.
In the meantime, disabling the addon or viewing on an in private browser when accessing the SSA’s website will fix the problem.
That covers this report. I plan to pick up blogging again in 2023. Have a great holiday and stay safe.
