Upstart Russian browser strips down to take on Google

Yandex.Browser puts tabs on the bottom to give as much attention to the Web app or website you're using as possible.Screenshot by Stephen Shankland/CNET

Yandex released a beta version of its streamlined Yandex.Browser Thursday, a Web browser designed to strip the clutter out of using the Web and help the Russian company stand up to Google.

The company first released a browser in 2012, but in 2014 unveiled a concept with a dramatically different, pared-back interface. This system is designed to put almost all the focus on websites and as little as possible on browser controls like buttons and search bars. For example, tabs that house individual websites are moved down to the bottom of the page, reflecting their subordinate status.

Browser technology languished for the better part of a decade after Microsoft's Internet Explorer won the first browser wars at the end of the 1990s. But browsers have become strategic tools for some of tech's biggest companies -- Yandex now among them -- triggering an explosion of competition that has made the Web vastly more useful to the average person. Better performance and new features mean the Web is becoming much more sophisticated as a publishing medium, even as it expands into a foundation for interactive applications too.The beta release signals that Yandex is ready for a wider audience to test the browser -- it's available now for Microsoft's Windows and Apple's OS X and is coming later for phones andtablets. Additionally, it shows that the company is committed to its browser project, despite the fact that the vast majority of the browser market power is concentrated in the hands of Google, Microsoft, Apple and Mozilla.

Firefox steered browsers away from Microsoft's in-house Web technology toward newer, standardized features any browser could use. Apple breathed life into mobile browsers. Chrome pushed browser speeds ahead. All this led Microsoft to throw away old Internet Explorer baggage and start fresh with the modernized, faster-moving, fuller-featured new Edge browser that's due later this year with Windows 10.

Concentrated power

So far though, the browser world's power is concentrated in Google Chrome, Apple Safari, Mozilla Firefox and Microsoft Internet Explorer. But Yandex has some reason to believe in its project.

In Russia, Yandex is something of a mini-Google, operating a panoply of online services, and it's held its own competing against the larger US company. Its online search site has 40 percent share of usage compared to Google's 51 percent, according to April measurements from analytics firm StatCounter. Yandex also offers services for email, maps, cloud-based document storage, online translation and more.

Yandex.Browser places seventh for global PC browser usage -- but only accounts for 0.4 percent of website usage.Data from StatCounter; chart by Stephen Shankland/CNET

Search ads can provide a major revenue source. These are the ads derived from online search terms and placed alongside search results. But Google's increasingly influential Chrome browser was hurting Yandex's search business, Yandex spokesman Vladimir Isaev has explained.

"Securing search share was one of reasons we had to launch our own browser," he said, describing that it had become harder for third parties to integrate their search services into Chrome and more difficult for people to select them. "We would be in trouble on desktops [without] launching our own browser."

Search revenue key

Search ads represent about 97 percent of Yandex's revenue. In the first quarter of 2015, that was 12.3 billion rubles ($211.1 million). The company's profit for that quarter was 2.1 billion ($36.4 million). Yandex isn't the size of companies like Google and Microsoft, but it is large, with 5,603 employees at the end of March.

Worldwide, Yandex.Browser has attained a creditable seventh-place finish in the browser market, but that's only 0.4 percent of PC browser usage, according to StatCounter. In Russia though it fares better, with fifth place and 10 percent share of PC browser usage.

Yandex.Browser's iconYandex

"The browser market is very liquid and fast-changing," Isaev said. "You remember how long IE dominance continued on the market. Then Chrome began to grow, and now it is a leader."

Most people using Yandex services are in Russia, Turkey and Ukraine. In those markets, Yandex has more than 100 million monthly users, and Yandex services are integrated with the browser. "Yandex.Browser is a natural gateway to Yandex services for them," Isaev said. By contrast, the new Yandex.Browser offers users a choice of search engines when they first install the software (specifics vary by country).

Companies that have their own browser have another financial advantage: they don't have to share revenue with other companies that refer traffic to their search engine. That's one reason Google has called Chrome so successful. In 2013, Google paid Mozilla $314 million for the people who used Firefox to search with Google.

Meet Yandex's browser

Although Yandex.Browser challenges Google, it also relies on it. Google's Chrome browser is based on the open-source Chromium browser project, using elements like the Blink engine to turn website programming instructions into the pictures and text you see on the screen. Open-source software can be freely used and modified by anyone, and that's what Yandex is doing for the basis of its browser. Chromium is mostly the same as Chrome, but the latter has some proprietary elements mixed in that can't be shared freely. This includes support for video that's been compressed with the patent-protected H.264 technology.

Yandex also contributes some work back to the Chromium open-source project -- for example, byexpanding some new networking features.

Piggybacking on Chromium is important: the table stakes for offering a browser are high, and using Google's software means companies don't have to spend lots of money paying programmers to reinvent the wheel. That's why another browser maker, Opera Software, switched from its own browser foundation to Chrome, and it's why Google based Chrome on Apple's open-source WebKit project, and why Apple based its WebKit project on another open-source browser called KHTML.

Using Chromium also means Yandex.Browser isn't a burden for developers who already have plenty of problems making sure their websites work properly on multiple browsers.

Yandex.Browser offers a choice of search engines when first installed. The choices vary by country.Screenshot by Stephen Shankland/CNET

Yandex offers differences, though, besides the interface. For instance, it has its own safe browsing service to try to keep people from visiting sites infected with harmful software. It's also got a turbo mode licensed from Opera that can compress text, images and video for better performance on slow networks.

Stealth mode

Yandex.Browser also has a "stealth mode" option developed by AdGuard, easily enabled by clicking an icon of a stealth fighter jet in the upper-right corner of the screen. It blocks website analytics tools and other technology that can be used to track user behavior.

Privacy was a concern the during international expansion of Yandex.Browser, which is available in 15 languages. One change from the prototype version of the browser is that in countries including the US and Germany, the browser doesn't share anonymous usage data with Yandex unless the user specifically enables it.

The browser includes Adobe Systems' Flash Player plugin -- a technology that's fading from modern websites but is still widely used for things like streaming video and games. For viewing PDF (Portable Document Format) files, Yandex includes the PDFium software from Google.

Yandex.Browser can also use extensions to get new abilities. Saving articles with Pocket to read later, synchronizing passwords with LastPass and storing notes with Evernote are all available options. A Yandex.Browser extensions site, operated by Opera Software, lists more than 600 extensions, but the software will also run add-ons from Google's Chrome Web Store, Isaev said.

Yandex.Browser is a balancing act between the company's own software and technology from others. Its international ambitions are limited, but closer to home, Yandex thinks it'll keep its edge.

"We think we can compete in this market," Isaev said.

Russian hacking group reportedly exploited Flash, Windows

The hacking group reportedly exploited security holes in Adobe's Flash and Microsoft's Windows.Getty Images/Ikon Images

A group of Russian hackers has been using flaws in two popular pieces of software -- Adobe's Flash and Microsoft's Windows operating system -- to try to get information about other governments, according to a report published by FireEye, a well-known United States security firm.

FireEye in October said the group, called APT28, is after information about governments, militaries and security organizations -- including the US and other diplomatic targets -- that would "likely benefit the Russian government."

One of the ways it has been doing that has been to exploit security holes in Windows, the top operating system for desktop computers, and Adobe's Flash, which lets you see animations and designs on the Web. Reuters earlier wrote about the FireEye report.

Adobe has already issued a fix and Microsoft is currently working on one, according to FireEye. The Microsoft problem is reportedly less dangerous because it involves "enhanced powers" on a computer that an ordinary user would not have, according to Reuters.

Adobe and Microsoft did not immediately return requests for comment.

Cybersecurity has become a top of mind issue not only in Silicon Valley but across all other industries. Part of that is thanks to high-profile attacks in recent years against governments, newspapers and big companies. A devastating hack of Sony Entertainment in November revealed embarrassing secrets about the company, including financial data, information about its executives and plans for upcoming projects. Some, including the FBI, blamed the hack on the North Korean government.

The report comes a day before the beginning of the RSA conference in San Francisco, the US's largest confab of companies and experts from the cyber security industry.

APT28 has been at it since 2007 and allegedly has a government sponsor based in Moscow, said FireEye. Other security firms have tied the group to a breach in the US State Department, seeking information about President Barack Obama's travel schedule.

Russia now squeezes the Internet

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg on a visit to Russia.Facebook

Russia's parliament has passed legislation that could see Western technology firms barred from operating if they fail to store Russian data within the country.

The legislation would require tech giants, such as Facebook, Google's Gmail, and Microsoft-owned Skype, to put Russian customer data on Russian soil in order to allow authorities to legally acquire and inspect data at will.

Currently, Russian authorities have no powers to acquire data outside its borders, unless they submit a lawful mutual legal assistance request, which can be denied by another nation.

The "Information, Information Technologies and Protection of Information" amendment, part of the country's anti-terrorism laws, would require Russian data to be stored within the country in order to be accessed by state security and intelligence services.

Should domestic Russian or foreign email, social networking, and instant messaging providers fail to provide access to six months' worth of data, they face being barred from operating in the country altogether.

The Russian Duma, the country's lower house, moved to adopt the legislation as of Tuesday following a successful third reading of the bill.

The legislation -- which has yet to be approved by Russian President Vladimir Putin -- would force foreign companies to install servers and data centers inside Russia in order to be compliant. It would give the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB, formerly KGB) and other media and "mass communication" regulators greater control over the Russian Internet and could see sites removed from the country's Internet register.

That would mean Internet providers on Russian soil could be forced to block access to sites and services, preventing them from being accessible to the general public.

It comes just two weeks after the European Union's highest court overturned similar, controversial data-retention laws, which had forced Internet providers to store data for up to two years for law enforcement and intelligence purposes.

As a non-European Union member, Russia recognizes some Brussels-born legislation in order to maintain relations with the 28-member state bloc, but actively rejects others -- not least in its anti-terrorism and data collection legislation.

Bloggers, citizen activists affected

The legislation (translated) states that any site operating in the country does "not allow... for the dissemination of materials... publicly justifying terrorism and other extremist materials, and materials that promote pornography, violence and cruelty, and materials containing obscene language."

It comes less than two years after the Russian government implemented an Internet blacklist law under the guise of anti-pornography and extremist sites rhetoric, which allows the Russian authorities to censor sites that would hamper political opponents of the ruling administration.

The Kremlin-supported bill, which passed in July 2012, forced any website falling foul of its strict anti-"extremist" law to remove content or face being adding to the blacklist within 24 hours.

The "blacklist" law came at a time during the Pussy Riot furor, which landed the four members of the Russian punk band in prison for two years after they allegedly broke hooliganism laws, a criminal offense under the country's judicial system.

The band's videos, uploaded to YouTube and other sites, were blocked from access within the country following a Russian court's decision to classify the content as "extremist" material under the blacklist law.

Yandex, a Russia-based Internet provider, said in a statement (translated): "In our opinion, the adoption of the law will be another step towards the strengthening of state control over the Internet in Russia, which has a negative impact on the development industry."

The legislation can also be applied to bloggers, citizen journalists, and activists, according to the bill's text, which would also force them to "place on their website... their name and initials, the email address for sending him a legally meaningful message."

Increasing isolation

The Putin and Medvedev tag-team administration has since 2012 ramped up its Internet monitoring and censorship activities as it faces increased pressure from Western governments over claims of internal power struggles and political corruption -- not least from opposition political groups that claim they are being oppressed by the federal government.

Russia, with a population of more than 145 million, continues to face increasing isolation from the G8 group of countries over its annexation of Crimea after the former Ukrainian president fled the country amid an uprising earlier this year. The annexation, decried as an unconstitutional move by the Ukrainian government, led the peninsula to become de-facto Russian territory, but has not been legally recognized by the US or European authorities.

Russia's recent legislature has led privacy experts to warn of the restriction of freedom of speech, information, and politics of opposition members critical of the Kremlin and Putin regime.

In the past week alone, Pavel Durov, founder of Russia's largest social network, VK.com, which has more than 100 million users, claimed he was fired, according to BBC News. He alleges that allies of Putin took over the site after he refused requests from the Russian government to censor posts on his site.

Durov has since fled Russia and says he has no plans to return. "[Russia] is now incompatible with Internet business at the moment," he told TechCrunch in an interview on Wednesday.

Russia's lower parliament has also banned swearing in films, plays, concerts and shows, BBC News reports.