Hacking and data attacks are made in many ways, which help an attacker access your information. But you are likely to be unaware of a hacker-used technique, Clickjacking. Unlike social engineering, SQL injection, DDoS attacks, and others, Clickjacking is not discussed much. However, it is equally harmful and vulnerable as others.
What is Clickjacking, how to prevent it, and where is it found? To all these questions this article would help to answer. However, it is baffling to identify this method of hacking.
What is Clickjacking
As it seems by name, clickjacking is a technique by which the user is trapped by clicking anything. It is done in many ways by deceiving the user as the object they are clicking differs from what it seems to them.
UI addressing is another term used for Clickjacking. The process includes a technique by placing the user-expected interface under another transparent user interface. That’s why the user clicking on something interesting turns out to be malicious for their device and data.
Another tactic this method uses is distracting the user by altering the cursor position. The cursor displayed at one position is actually in another. An attacker can make people click on things that give their personal information through this.
Clickjacking includes a range of unusual and ingenious attacks. Similar was the one reported recently, in which an innocent-looking image on WhatsApp could transfer your account control to the image sender once the receiver clicks the image.
Social-engineering attacks are also included in the clickjacking category by some individuals. For instance, a tweet including a link and the phrase ‘don’t click’ was circulated in 2009. And when anyone clicks on it, the same thing is tweeted from their account. Such a method is also used to earn money through links on Facebook.
You are mistaken if you assume that Clickjacking is just done through clicking. It is also reported on Android devices. Android.Lockdroid. E, android ransomware controls the targeted device through Clickjacking.
How to prevent Clickjacking
If you are a website administrator, you can prevent Clickjacking. But if not, there are a few efficient and valuable ways to avoid Clickjacking.
However, one of the most suggested ways to prevent Clickjacking is to use the No-script Firefox extension while browsing. Same as Advertisement avoiding extensions, No-script will prevent any script from loading until particular authentication from you.
No script with anti-clickjacking features will identify the script that generates transparent web overlays. Specific extensions preventing script features and app downloading could also save you from Clickjacking.
However, site admins are how best clickjacking defenses could be gained. Yet, most of them are abstruse and technical. But if you want the way to implement them, you can check out at Clickjacking Defense Cheat Sheet from OWASP.
To stop Clickjacking, you could also include an x-frame-options HTTP header, one of the most efficient ways to protect your site. It inhibits your website’s content from being loaded in a frame (<frame> tag) or iframe (<iframe> tag).
Alleviating the threat is an effective way to avoid Clickjacking, as this tactic is used as an attack facilitator for Clickjacking and other malicious attacks.
X-Frame options, you can use
There are three possible values for the X-frame-options header;
- DENY: The page cannot be displayed on a frame even if the site attempts to do so
- SAMEORIGIN: This only allows the current site to frame the content.
- ALLOW-FROM URI: The page can only be displayed on the specified origin frame.
A genuine concern for everyone nowadays is any vulnerability in their Android devices. To reduce the chances of Clickjacking on your phone, you should use authentic and trusted apps for downloading.
Downloading apps such as Apple App Store or the Google Play Store are less likely to include any malicious stuff than any third-party source, yet they are also not fully free from such vulnerabilities.
In-app browsers are the most likely place where you can face clickjacking attacks. So, instead of using the in-app browser, you could set the default behavior for link-opening in your apps to open in the system browser. This will dispose of one more chance of you being trapped.
Conclusion
Clickjacking seems more nuisance than it is; however, if an attacker uses it efficiently and cleverly, it could give them access to your sensitive information and personal accounts.
Clickjacking could give you serious harm as it usually comes from an indiscriminate source. To avoid Clickjacking, you could use script-blocking extensions, but remember that these add-ons are also a bit controversial.
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About the Author
Zehra Ali is a Tech Reporter and Journalist. She has done her Masters in Mass Communication. Topics related to cybersecurity, IoT, AI, Big Data and other privacy matters are extensively covered by her on various platforms. You can follow her on twitter.
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