1176741 - Extend Safe Browsing with URL-classification for "inadjacent" (adult, drug, violence) sites

Status: RESOLVED WONTFIX

(Toolkit :: Safe Browsing, defect)

Description

[maxim zhilyaev]

Bug 1105376 is a feature where we choose not to show tiles in the context of other sites' tiles. Specifically, Mozilla partners request their tiles NOT be shown next to tiles of questionable content such as adult, drug or violence related: hence the "inadjecent" notation. 

Content services implemented a "simple" approach of hardcoding a list of such sites into a browser (see bug 1159884). This is clearly a sub-optimal solution hence, the request to use Safe Browsing facility to manage "inadjacent" sites updates and in-browser lookup (see Bug 1105376).

Note that while newtab is just a client of "inadjacent" sites classification, there is no reason why other parts of the browser can't check if page is rated-R and provide for extra child and/or browser safety warnings. Which suggests extending Safe Browsing to provide generic support for inadjacent table(s), then newtab code simply follows url-classification API.

NOTES:

- The initial list of inadjacent sites being currently used is here: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1160596#c1
- It would be preferable to use Google services if they maintain such database
- Content Services can host the Safe Browsing files, but would prefer if they are served from tracking.services.mozilla.com
- Newtab needs to be always able to test a site for "inadjacency" even when a user turns off corresponding Safe Browsing settings in config.

Comment 1

[François Marier [:francois]]

We're no longer putting partner ads on the newtab page, so I guess this is no longer needed.