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Conspiracy Alert Plugin

This repository provides the conspiracy alert plugin cited in the USENIX Security 2025 paper:

The Conspiracy Money Machine: Uncovering Telegram's Conspiracy Channels and their Profit Model

If you use this plugin, or the findings from the paper, please cite:

@inproceedings{imperati2025conspiracy,
  title={The Conspiracy Money Machine: Uncovering Telegram's Conspiracy Channels and their Profit Model},
  author={Imperati, Vincenzo and La Morgia, Massimo and Mei, Alessandro and Mongardini, Alberto Maria and Sassi, Francesco},
  booktitle={34th USENIX Security Symposium (USENIX Security 25)},
  year={2025}
}

Table of Contents

Overview

This repository contains the browser extension client for the Channel Checker backend. The rebuilt client calls the FastAPI backend from channel-checker-bot, stores only the latest tab evaluation in Chrome local extension storage, and renders a compact popup for the current tab. The backend URL defaults to http://127.0.0.1:8000 and can be changed from the extension options page. When a page URL matches a dataset or monetization signal, the extension also shows a non-blocking in-page banner and marks the extension icon with a per-tab badge.

For a reviewer-friendly setup path, start with ARTIFACT.md.

Prerequisites

Before you begin, ensure you have the following installed:

  • Node.js 24 with npm, matching CI.
  • Git.
  • The sibling channel-checker-bot and conspiracy-dataset-telegram repositories when running the extension against the paper artifact backend.

Installation

Backend Setup

Run the backend from the sibling channel-checker-bot repository:

cd ../channel-checker-bot
CHANNEL_CHECKER_DATASET_DIR=../conspiracy-dataset-telegram \
PYTHONPATH=src uvicorn --factory channel_checker.api.server:create_app_from_environment \
  --host 127.0.0.1 \
  --port 8000

Client Setup

  1. Navigate to the client directory:

      cd client

  2. Install the required Node.js packages:

      npm ci

  3. Run client checks:

      npm test
  npm run check
  npm run build

Building the Client

To build the client for production, run the following command in the client directory:

  npm run build

This will create a production-ready build of the client in the dist folder.

To create the installable ZIP artifact used by CI:

  npm run package

The archive is written to client/release/ and contains the built extension files from dist.

Installing the Browser Plugin

To install the custom browser plugin, follow these steps:

  1. Open Chrome and go to chrome://extensions/.
  2. Enable "Developer mode" by toggling the switch in the top right corner.
  3. Click on "Load unpacked".
  4. Select the dist folder from the client directory where the build was created.
  5. The plugin should now be installed and visible in your extensions.

Usage

Once the plugin is installed, you can access its features directly from your browser's toolbar. Use the popup Settings button, or the browser extension details page, to configure a non-default backend URL.

On matching pages, the content script asks the background worker to evaluate the current URL and shows a dismissible banner inside the page. The browser toolbar popup does not open automatically. Dataset/resource matches are labeled as questionable resources; affiliate, donation, crowdfunding, marketplace, and commerce-path matches are labeled as monetization signals. If the backend is unavailable, the page is not modified and the extension icon shows a ? badge.

Automatic in-page checks are enabled by default and can be disabled from the extension options page. The popup still supports manual checks through Check now.

License

This software artifact is released under the MIT License. See LICENSE.