I have the full version of Malwarebytes on my laptop, and as a part of “full protection” the program is suggesting downloading the browser extension. I wanted to ask around here to get opinions on if there’s any point in getting the extension? I have the UBlock Origin extension (firefox), and the Malwarebytes application on my computer has access to the browser and catches things there-- I’ve seen it in real time. So what would be the point of an extension on top of that?
It’s weird because the program is suggesting it as a last step to full protection, so its suggesting under the assumption that I DO have the computer application. Which leads me to think there is something that the extension does that isn’t just overlap coverage but I can’t figure out what…
Usually, it is recommended not to use 3rd party anti virus software and to only use windows defender and good security practices. So, to answer your question, I personally wouldn’t install a closed source browser extension that will only really increase your attack surface. Furthermore, modern browsers are already very secure, so there isn’t really that much of a point to having this extension.
Malwarebytes has already lost its purpose IMHO, now thay we have persistent rootkits and UEFI malware in our current security paradigm. Its hard to trust compromised systems because we cannot really check if the UEFI has been tampered but appears untampered.
Back then you can “re-trust” most computers because once you do a nuke and pave, malware does not survive a full reformat. Malwarebytes just tries to save you a bit of that hassle by trying to clean up known malware and it was good enough for its time. These days, not so much.
I wouldn’t do that. It’s better to keep using uBlock Origin and limit additional extensions, especially if they are closed source (Please read what Avast did with their extension).