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Washington Post's Privacy Tip: Stop Using Chrome, Delete Meta Apps (and Yandex)

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Re: Washington Post's Privacy Tip: Stop Using Chrome, Delete Meta Apps (and Yandex)

#61

Post by kstrauser »

bitpush wrote: post #43
hk1337 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

JavaScript Chrome developers did a good job of convincing people that Safari is the new IE. I love Safari on macOS. I love the pinch/zoom with the tabs. I love that private browsing mode, at least seems to, keep things contained to the tab they started with. e.g. if I open facebook in a private tab then open new tab and go to facebook, it’s going to make me login.

You're drinking Apple kool-aid if you think Safari isn't holding web back. Lots of anti-google people dislike Safari. Safari isn't the only non-google option you know.

Safari is far from perfect, but I’m glad they don’t implement everything Chrome does. Many of the complaints come down to “Safari doesn’t even support RunBitcoinMinerInBackground.js. It sucks!”

And on the plus side, it’s vastly better at power efficiency, meaning I can use my laptop longer without being plugged in.

Re: Washington Post's Privacy Tip: Stop Using Chrome, Delete Meta Apps (and Yandex)

#62

Post by kstrauser »

hungryhobbit wrote: post #45
hk1337 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

JavaScript Chrome developers did a good job of convincing people that Safari is the new IE. I love Safari on macOS. I love the pinch/zoom with the tabs. I love that private browsing mode, at least seems to, keep things contained to the tab they started with. e.g. if I open facebook in a private tab then open new tab and go to facebook, it’s going to make me login.

Developers don't convince anyone of anything! They just build stuff according to standards (which are inevitably set not by standards orgs, but by the most popular browsers), and then they expect all browsers to follow those standards and "just work". When a browser like Safari fails to adhere to those standards, sites will break ... but you can't expect developers (of most sites; I'm not talking about the top 100 or…

Wikipedia says Safari’s their #2 browser, with 17% traffic share: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_web_browsers

Web devs ignore Safari at their own risk, lest 100% of iPhone users be unable to use their site.

Re: Washington Post's Privacy Tip: Stop Using Chrome, Delete Meta Apps (and Yandex)

#63

Post by zahlman »

demosthanos wrote: post #38
jfengel wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does the ad blocker prevent leaks of your information? I know it blocks a use of your information against you (targeted ads). And any external source is a potential leak (e.g. the kinds of things that CORS is supposed to reduce). But does an ad blocker specifically leak more, or just reduce the incentive to collect that information?

A full-featured ad blocker (uBlock Origin original, not the neutered Lite version that runs on Chrome now) will intercept requests at the network level and prevent your browser from requesting the advertisers' JavaScript code. Your browser not only won't show the ads, it won't run the code that was supposed to show them or even send a request to the advertisers' servers. This blocks most existing tracking methods. Th…

>prevent your browser from requesting the advertisers' JavaScript code. Your browser not only won't show the ads, it won't run the code that was supposed to show them or even send a request to the advertisers' servers.

Incidentally, just blocking JavaScript with NoScript kills quite a lot of ads (obviously, not first-party ones if you've white-listed their JavaScript for site functionality; but I try to avoid that when there isn't real demonstrated value) without any need for an explicit ad blocker.

Re: Washington Post's Privacy Tip: Stop Using Chrome, Delete Meta Apps (and Yandex)

#64

Post by zahlman »

NHQ wrote: post #52

Web browsers should become outmoded soon. It was fine for bootstrapping the web, but now to keep up a browser must emulate the operating system and more in a single app. This pressure is the centralizing factor in browser dominance. Ditch the features, drop the spy protocol (http), just get the files.

> the spy protocol (http)

I'm afraid I can't guess your reasoning.

Re: Washington Post's Privacy Tip: Stop Using Chrome, Delete Meta Apps (and Yandex)

#65

Post by turtletontine »

duxup wrote: post #35
timewizard wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Chrome is fine. Letting an advertising company own it is not.

I feel like that's like saying "it's fine, except for the bad part that you can't avoid" ;)

The future of Google as Chrome’s owner is genuinely in question now due to Google’s antitrust losses, in case you weren’t aware.

There’s a few different cases, one recent one Google has lost and is now in the “remedy” phase. Meaning the court has officially decided Google did bad, and is now considering what to make Google do about it. And splitting up Google into separate Chrome, search, etc companies is completely on the table.

Some reading:

https://www.theverge.com/23869483/us-v-google-search-antitru...

https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/google-found-guilty-of-mo...

Re: Washington Post's Privacy Tip: Stop Using Chrome, Delete Meta Apps (and Yandex)

#66

Post by guywithahat »

GolfPopper wrote: post #25
wyattblue wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Brave Browser: https://brave.com/

Brave has some controversies: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brave_(web_browser)#Controvers...

I mean those aren't real controversies though, it's more like "we added a VPN feature and included the VPN, but have now removed it". A real controversy would be like Mozilla who was pushing for censorship and silencing "bad actors" in the years after the first Trump election.

Re: Washington Post's Privacy Tip: Stop Using Chrome, Delete Meta Apps (and Yandex)

#68

Post by Legend2440 »

p0w3n3d wrote: post #28

I've noticed that recent Chrome version does not allow me to download the pdf I'm viewing. I had to open it in Firefox. The Chrome browser only allowed me to save it to drive (cloud)

Seems weird. I'm in Chrome right now and I can right-click on PDFs and click save as.

Re: Washington Post's Privacy Tip: Stop Using Chrome, Delete Meta Apps (and Yandex)

#69

Post by jeffbee »

It's sort of interesting that Brave was not affected by this because they already blocked the technique used by the Yandex app. I wonder if Brave devs were aware of that specific abuse, or if they just thought that localhost traffic was distasteful categorically.

Re: Washington Post's Privacy Tip: Stop Using Chrome, Delete Meta Apps (and Yandex)

#70

Post by kvdveer »

zahlman wrote: post #63
demosthanos wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A full-featured ad blocker (uBlock Origin original, not the neutered Lite version that runs on Chrome now) will intercept requests at the network level and prevent your browser from requesting the advertisers' JavaScript code. Your browser not only won't show the ads, it won't run the code that was supposed to show them or even send a request to the advertisers' servers. This blocks most existing tracking methods. Th…

>prevent your browser from requesting the advertisers' JavaScript code. Your browser not only won't show the ads, it won't run the code that was supposed to show them or even send a request to the advertisers' servers. Incidentally, just blocking JavaScript with NoScript kills quite a lot of ads (obviously, not first-party ones if you've white-listed their JavaScript for site functionality; but I try to avoid that wh…

NoScript is indeed very effective at blocking tracking, but it also breaks a lot of websites.

If that is an acceptable compromise, you could also try ditching the Internet altogether, as that not only blocks all online tracking, it also blocks a lot of fraud, misinformation and all kinds of harmful content.

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