General add-ons compatibility [and in particular Privacy Badger]

[soewhaty]

Thanks for the reply! Don't have much experience with the Disconnect addon, just with the Disconnect search engine, if it's even the same company behind it. What I can say is that my Disconnect search history appeared in my google history and was thus tracked by google. So that's that. With duckduckgo this wasn't the case, at least back then when I tested. As to uB (and uM and NoScrip) ... I consider those 3 addons quite good and privacy-centric. Ghostery however, is definitely no longer a privacy-centric addon cos it was already publicly disclosed that it gathers your data and simply resells it afterwards ... so Ghostery is a no for me.

[GreenGeek]

I looked into Disconnect and found it unacceptable - their list was useless (too many sites I would never visit) as well as untrustworthy (biased toward sites I consider unfavorable). So that leaves newer Ghostery, Privacy Badger, and Disconnect all as unacceptable based on privacy. Fortunately I don't need them.

[Falna]

So that leaves newer Ghostery, Privacy Badger, and Disconnect all as unacceptable based on privacy.

I've not seen any privacy concerns about Privacy Badger - and it's produced by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, who are among the foremost advocates of privacy. Though as a SDK-based extension it's incompatible with PM 27.

[soewhaty]

So that leaves newer Ghostery, Privacy Badger, and Disconnect all as unacceptable based on privacy.

I've not seen any privacy concerns about Privacy Badger - and it's produced by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, who are among the foremost advocates of privacy. Though as a SDK-based extension it's incompatible with PM 27.

That's what I thought too, until I read half-moon's take on it - viewtopic.php?f=16&t=13888#p98663 . TBH, dunno what to think. I did think EFF are doing some good job, especially taken their HTTPS-Everywhere addon, which made it to the Tor bundle but ... if P.Badger was as good, then I guess it would also have made it to the Tor bundle, which it currently still hasn't done. It will either be included at a later point or half-moon is right in saying it is shady.

[riiis]

I looked into Disconnect and found it unacceptable - their list was useless ...

Mozilla seems to hold a differing opinion (Tracking Protection in Mozilla Firefox Private Browsing:):

Tracking generally refers to the collection of a person’s browsing data across multiple sites. The Tracking Protection feature uses a list provided by Disconnect to identify and block trackers.

There are over 885,000 users of Disconnect for Google Chrome and over 286,000 users of Disconnect for Firefox. Perhaps more than a few of these users would disagree with you, as well.

[GreenGeek]

What's your point? Numbers don't mean anything to me. I don't use Google's site or browser. Mozilla has made a million bad decisions - they even used Google for "Safe Browsing".

[soewhaty]

I looked into Disconnect and found it unacceptable - their list was useless ...

Mozilla seems to hold a differing opinion (Tracking Protection in Mozilla Firefox Private Browsing:):

Tracking generally refers to the collection of a person’s browsing data across multiple sites. The Tracking Protection feature uses a list provided by Disconnect to identify and block trackers.

There are over 885,000 users of Disconnect for Google Chrome and over 286,000 users of Disconnect for Firefox. Perhaps more than a few of these users would disagree with you, as well.

Do you really trust Moz. when it comes to privacy opinion??? As to disconnect - as I said, my browsing history using disconnect search engine was stored in my google browsing history as well, so that establishes my firm opinion about em. Pls don't get this wrong as I'm not trying to side with anyone on this but the 1 million ppl you're mentioning to use this or that means absolutely nothing for well ... obvious reasons. Even if that number was 1 billion, I hope you realize the informational eclipse we nowadays live in, especially in terms of privacy, but not only that.

[soewhaty]

What's your point? Numbers don't mean anything to me. I don't use Google's site or browser. Mozilla has made a million bad decisions - they even used Google for "Safe Browsing".

Good point and that's what I try to do for most of my day, but now and then I have to use google's search engine cos the billions of dollars they got (prolly earned from spying on ppl) have resulted in prolly the best searching algorithms out there. When I've used other search engines and search functions on sites and whatever I've been either 1) amazed how rudimentary some are in terms of searching and matching capability or 2) they simply use google's search functions. But in general completely agree with you approach.

[Shadeclan]

... now and then I have to use google's search engine cos the billions of dollars they got (prolly earned from spying on ppl) have resulted in prolly the best searching algorithms out there ...

That may have been true in the past, but not anymore. Certainly, not if you hold governmentally unsanctioned views. I, myself, use StartPage (which is a Google scraper) for searches on topics like programming languages but, if I'm looking for something else, I'd recommend Ixquick. I think anything StartPage does is geared toward privacy, even more so than DuckDuckGo. Their servers are even located outside the United States, so they're not subject to seizure.

[soewhaty]

... now and then I have to use google's search engine cos the billions of dollars they got (prolly earned from spying on ppl) have resulted in prolly the best searching algorithms out there ...

That may have been true in the past, but not anymore. Certainly, not if you hold governmentally unsanctioned views. I, myself, use StartPage (which is a Google scraper) for searches on topics like programming languages but, if I'm looking for something else, I'd recommend Ixquick. I think anything StartPage does is geared toward privacy, even more so than DuckDuckGo. Their servers are even located outside the United States, so they're not subject to seizure.

Well, for 99% of the time i use DuckDuckGo, that 1% ... I might be wrong but think that Google's search algorithms are better than DDG's when I need to dig out something or when I need info very quickly. G's search algorithms seem to more quickly find what I'm looking for and that's not cos they know all about my prior search history. I disabled that as well as a ton of other google spyware more than a year ago. So it can't be just cos they know what I'm looking for that they quicker provide the right searches.

Will look at your article though! 10x Not sure what to choose between DDG and StartPage but the latter's server's not being in the US sounds indeed very good!

[GreenGeek]

That may have been true in the past, but not anymore.

I read a couple of those articles (hadn't visited that site in years). Then just now got a message from the cell phone service provider that I can't use my flip phone (just recently gave up smart phone) to access account info anymore after Dec. 29 due to security changes. Why isn't the phone secure enough to access its own account info? (rhetorical) And what security changes I wonder.

[soewhaty]

That may have been true in the past, but not anymore.

I read a couple of those articles (hadn't visited that site in years). Then just now got a message from the cell phone service provider that I can't use my flip phone (just recently gave up smart phone) to access account info anymore after Dec. 29 due to security changes. Why isn't the phone secure enough to access its own account info? (rhetorical) And what security changes I wonder.

LOL, nice one! Gots to be the easy of owning users that makes them force ppl to switch to and stay glued to smart phones instead of the good old simple old-fashioned phones! I mean, ppl nowadays everywhere are ANYWAY glued to fb 24/7/365 and they volunteered for that so pwned they want to be, pwned they are ...

[Moonchild]

Some important information about Privacy Badger:

Cooper Quintin, one of the two maintainers of it, has indicated they are moving to WebExtensions completely, but he gave the OK for a community fork of the legacy version of Privacy Badger to be created carrying the same name for Pale Moon use.

I've forked the repository of the legacy (SDK) extension here:
https://github.com/Pale-Moon-Addons-Team/privacybadgerfirefox-legacy

It doesn't have anyone working on it right now, and will likely need some hackery to be made to run on Pale Moon 27 by making it bootstrap and hooking into the toolkit jetpack modules. If anyone wants to tinker with it to make it work, feel free!

[soewhaty]

I, myself, use StartPage (which is a Google scraper) for searches on topics like programming languages but, if I'm looking for something else, I'd recommend Ixquick. I think anything StartPage does is geared toward privacy, even more so than DuckDuckGo. Their servers are even located outside the United States, so they're not subject to seizure.

Thanks for those 2, but just to ask - what is the difference? https://ixquick.com/ and https://www.startpage.com/ look pretty much the same so how are they any different?

[soewhaty]

Some important information about Privacy Badger:

Cooper Quintin, one of the two maintainers of it, has indicated they are moving to WebExtensions completely, but he gave the OK for a community fork of the legacy version of Privacy Badger to be created carrying the same name for Pale Moon use.

I've forked the repository of the legacy (SDK) extension here:
https://github.com/Pale-Moon-Addons-Team/privacybadgerfirefox-legacy

It doesn't have anyone working on it right now, and will likely need some hackery to be made to run on Pale Moon 27 by making it bootstrap and hooking into the toolkit jetpack modules. If anyone wants to tinker with it to make it work, feel free!

Thanks for the update, man! Appreciate your effort! Hope whoever gets to tinker around with it will remove the shadiness of the addon mentioned by half-moon and prolly others - viewtopic.php?f=16&t=13888#p98663 and especially the history it stores but without letting you to delete it!!!

PS if you or anyone else from the mods or admins could change the thread name from:

General add-ons compatibility [and in particular Privacy Badger]
to
General add-ons compatibility [and in particular privacy ones]

I think it would make much more sense and help others, given where the discussion actually went, which is totally OK.

And is it just sth messed up in my settings or in general forum users here cannot edit their posts after an x number of hours/days?

[Moonchild]

Off-topic:

And is it just sth messed up in my settings or in general forum users here cannot edit their posts after an x number of hours/days?

That is by design on the forum. users in the past have been extremely destructive when disagreeing with a discussion/getting upset/throwing a tantrum, so we were forced to safeguard past conversations and post content from destructive tendencies by limiting the amount of time a user is allowed to edit their own posts.
On top, it prevents certain types of spam (necro-editing to slip in spam content).

[Shadeclan]

... Thanks for those 2, but just to ask - what is the difference? https://ixquick.com/ and https://www.startpage.com/ look pretty much the same so how are they any different?

They are both from the same company - StartPage. The difference is that the StartPage search engine gets its data by sending a query anonymously to Google and displaying the results - in this way, you get to use Google but Google has no information about you to save and sell. Ixquick is StartPage's proprietary search algorithm and doesn't use Google or any other search engine to retrieve its results.

StartPage goes to great lengths to protect your privacy and has some ... unique (? ?) ... ways of doing so, including an optional proxy you can use to view websites without revealing your identity or putting your computer at risk. Their StartMail email service is second to none where privacy and security are concerned - It's pay to play (about $60 US / year) and you can try out the service for a week for free. If you decide to open an account, you can get the first 3 months for free. You can check out their privacy Q&A if you want to know more, including how they make money without selling your info.

[soewhaty]

Thanks for the info! I don't know if there's any way of being 100% sure whether or not any privacy-centric organisation, be it a search engine like StartPage, a VPN, or anything else for that matter, does not simply gather and resell our info to the highest bidder. But for what it's worth, thanks for sharing info!

Their StartMail email service is second to none where privacy and security are concerned - It's pay to play (about $60 US / year) and you can try out the service for a week for free

As to the paid part - yeah, fair enough, but then again if they get $ from advertiser, then I don't see why they should charge users, but who knows. Maybe it's not enough and they need more - also fair nuff.

2nd to none also when we consider email providers such as:
https://tutanota.com/
https://www.autistici.org/en/index.html
https://riseup.net/
https://protonmail.com/ ?

[half-moon]

The only way to have complete email privacy, is by running your own mail server.

[Moonchild]

As to the paid part - yeah, fair enough, but then again if they get $ from advertiser, then I don't see why they should charge users

If they have ads and charge users, then they are just being greedy. On top of that, any ads displayed on the same page as your e-mail is a potential privacy hazard, so if that's the case then their security and privacy is far from "second to none".

The only way to have complete email privacy, is by running your own mail server.

Unfortunately many ISPs do not allow you to do this on a residential connection. usually only business accounts allow this (which generally cost).
Running it on a VPS needs you to trust the VPS provider explicitly.
If that hurdle is overcome then you need to know how to set up an MTA securely which isn't as straightforward as it may sound (one of the reasons we have a SPAM problem is poorly configured mail servers).