Best and free browser extensions to improve privacy and web experience in 2021 • Hacker News Board

Re: Best and free browser extensions to improve privacy and web experience in 2021

#11

Post by smcleod » Wed, Jan 06, 2021, 12:55 PM UTC

ffpip wrote: post #3

1. uBlock Origin is an essential addon. 2. Ninja Cookie - Cookie banners and other annoyances can be blocked with uBlock Origin. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8TvCGWwQr5o 3. Lastpass - Use your browser's built in manager. Chrome has a custom sync password and Firefox has a master password option. One less extension. 4. HTTPs everywhere can be avoided if you use Brave, as it automatically upgrades to HTTPs when avai…

From a comment I noted down some time ago where the user provided a comparison between Decentraleyes and LocalCDN:

- Decentraleyes has the advantage of being a "recommended" webextension which "undergoes a thorough technical security review to ensure it adheres to Mozilla’s add-on policies."

- Decentraleyes' has public ownership; Thomas Reintjes.

- Decentraleyes' last commit and last activity by the maintainer was 4 months ago; there are 78 open issues, and 9 merge requests with no indication of being merged in anytime soon. So I assume

- LocalCDN was forked because Decentraleyes actually appears stale which is unfortunate.

- LocalCDN doesn't have public ownership.

- LocalCDN isn't a recommended webextension and thus updates won't undergo "thorough technical security reviews."

- LocalCDN does support more assets/CDNs (which increases privacy beyond Decentraleyes) and will support more.

- LocalCDN has not slipped a new permission in. Compare LocalCDN's manifest.json with Decentraleyes'.

Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/privacytoolsIO/comments/fc05uh/comm...

Re: Best and free browser extensions to improve privacy and web experience in 2021

#12

Post by gorhill » Wed, Jan 06, 2021, 1:06 PM UTC

MrPatan wrote: post #2

Any browser extension can at any time be hacked by, or sold to, malicious actors that will make your computer theirs. If you wouldn't run a random executable from the internet to see "times around the world" don't get an extension to do it. It's the same risk.

In Firefox, extensions with the "Recommended" label have to go through code review with each update[1], and incidentally for a "times around the world" extension, there is FoxClocks with the "Recommended" label[2].

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[1] https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/add-on-badges#w_recomme...

[2] https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/foxclocks/

Re: Best and free browser extensions to improve privacy and web experience in 2021

#13

Post by Glench » Wed, Jan 06, 2021, 1:10 PM UTC

MrPatan wrote: post #2

Any browser extension can at any time be hacked by, or sold to, malicious actors that will make your computer theirs. If you wouldn't run a random executable from the internet to see "times around the world" don't get an extension to do it. It's the same risk.

Chrome and others are cracking down on the security issues. For one, whenever an extension’s permissions change in Chrome, the extension is (silently) disabled. Also, in manifest v3 externally downloaded JavaScript is not allowed at all.

Re: Best and free browser extensions to improve privacy and web experience in 2021

#14

Post by c0wb0yc0d3r » Wed, Jan 06, 2021, 2:34 PM UTC

turblety wrote: post #8

baliex wrote: post #7

Very surprised to see Grammarly on a privacy oriented list. Aren't they shipping off everything you type to their servers?

I feel like maybe the title means "improve privacy" and "improve web experiance" as a mixed list. As in, each item will be one, not both. It's a very strange list/mix up, and in my opinion a poor article. Grammarly would be awful for privacy. As would LastPass and EverNote.

I felt like this article was pretty low effort for sure. I didn't see anything close to an objective process for determining the best extensions and add-ons.

I'm curious why you say LastPass is awful from a privacy perspective?

Is it because you send your passwords to a service controlled by a 3rd party? Something more dubious?

Would you say the same about Bitwarden if you were hosting it yourself? Or the built-in browser manager (with syncing disabled)?

Re: Best and free browser extensions to improve privacy and web experience in 2021

#15

Post by ffpip » Wed, Jan 06, 2021, 2:52 PM UTC

smcleod wrote: post #11

ffpip wrote: post #3

1. uBlock Origin is an essential addon. 2. Ninja Cookie - Cookie banners and other annoyances can be blocked with uBlock Origin. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8TvCGWwQr5o 3. Lastpass - Use your browser's built in manager. Chrome has a custom sync password and Firefox has a master password option. One less extension. 4. HTTPs everywhere can be avoided if you use Brave, as it automatically upgrades to HTTPs when avai…

From a comment I noted down some time ago where the user provided a comparison between Decentraleyes and LocalCDN: - Decentraleyes has the advantage of being a "recommended" webextension which "undergoes a thorough technical security review to ensure it adheres to Mozilla’s add-on policies." - Decentraleyes' has public ownership; Thomas Reintjes. - Decentraleyes' last commit and last activity by the maintainer was 4…

Public ownership meaning open source?

Source for localCDN - https://codeberg.org/nobody/LocalCDN

LocalCDN's developer is extremely pro-privacy. The extension collects nothing. Privacy policy is one sentence.

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/localcdn-fork... https://www.localcdn.org/privacy.

Re: Best and free browser extensions to improve privacy and web experience in 2021

#16

Post by smcleod » Wed, Jan 06, 2021, 11:03 PM UTC

ffpip wrote: post #15

smcleod wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From a comment I noted down some time ago where the user provided a comparison between Decentraleyes and LocalCDN: - Decentraleyes has the advantage of being a "recommended" webextension which "undergoes a thorough technical security review to ensure it adheres to Mozilla’s add-on policies." - Decentraleyes' has public ownership; Thomas Reintjes. - Decentraleyes' last commit and last activity by the maintainer was 4…

Public ownership meaning open source? Source for localCDN - https://codeberg.org/nobody/LocalCDN LocalCDN's developer is extremely pro-privacy. The extension collects nothing. Privacy policy is one sentence. https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/localcdn-fork... https://www.localcdn.org/privacy .

Interesting, maybe the Reddit user got it wrong or perhaps it's been updated since they wrote the comparison.

Re: Best and free browser extensions to improve privacy and web experience in 2021

#17

Post by ffpip » Thu, Jan 07, 2021, 3:04 AM UTC

smcleod wrote: post #16

ffpip wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Public ownership meaning open source? Source for localCDN - https://codeberg.org/nobody/LocalCDN LocalCDN's developer is extremely pro-privacy. The extension collects nothing. Privacy policy is one sentence. https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/localcdn-fork... https://www.localcdn.org/privacy .

Interesting, maybe the Reddit user got it wrong or perhaps it's been updated since they wrote the comparison.

It's been the same since the extension started being developed.

Reddit comments are mostly the same info being spread again. One redditor must have posted wrong info and other users spread the same thing. Never trust them blindly.