Is it easier to avoid trackers using obscure net browsers?

Page 1 of 1 [ 11 posts ] 

Alienboy
Deinonychus
Deinonychus

User avatar

Joined: 22 Aug 2011
Gender: Male
Posts: 335
Location: The Goldilocks Zone

13 Apr 2012, 3:35 am

I am not really a computer person. I know a lot more about hardware than about software, and the workings of the internet. I got this terrible cluster of malware a few months ago and I am wondering if aside from a good firewall, anti-virus/malware/spyware programs, etc. would say switching from using firefox to something like Seamonkey, Konquerer, Arora, Camino, Flock, K-Melion, Maxthon, Pale Moon, etc. (there are tons) help with less frequent trackers? I know that the trackers you get depend on the site you visit and not the browser you are using...but do some of these browsers do a better job to fighting off all these trackers? I was going to download Ghostery...but many people say it is terrible and has a lot of bugs. I already disabled the 'Accept third-party cookies' option for firefox. I am not sure how much that helps though. Any computer experts on here that can help me out with this?


_________________
I know this great restaurant at the end of the universe.


HoodedShadow
Sea Gull
Sea Gull

User avatar

Joined: 10 Jun 2011
Age: 34
Gender: Male
Posts: 209
Location: Finland

13 Apr 2012, 6:21 am

What exactly do you mean by tracker and why do you compare it to malware?

Do Not Track Plus is kinda like Ghostery and works better in my opinion, though I'm currently using them both at the same time, I am also using Adblocker (for Chrome).
Do Not Track Plus -> https://chrome.google.com/webstore/deta ... kobaefekcd

Does your firewall/anti-virus scan internet traffic and webpages for malware?


_________________
http://www.wrongplanet.net/postt164561.html - My introduction
Diagnosed aspergers
Email or PM me!
Email address: http://www.google.com/recaptcha/mailhid ... 0lSIA-uw==


Shorttail
Blue Jay
Blue Jay

User avatar

Joined: 3 Feb 2012
Age: 39
Gender: Male
Posts: 95
Location: Aarhus, Denmark

13 Apr 2012, 7:30 am

I suggest you use Firefox and the wonderful ad-don No-Script. With that you need to manually temporarily or permanently all Javascript from sites based on the root of the script. For instance, this forum page shows scripts from google, sharethis, quantserve, gosquared, cloudfront, scorecardresearch, and wrongplanet. Some of them provide useful functionality and should not be squelched, but many of them, such as google-analytics, serve only third parties.
With No-Script, nothing runs before you let it.



Alienboy
Deinonychus
Deinonychus

User avatar

Joined: 22 Aug 2011
Gender: Male
Posts: 335
Location: The Goldilocks Zone

13 Apr 2012, 4:24 pm

I am not only only worried about getting viruses amd malware,etc. I am also concerned about trackers on the websites I browse having people able to see what I am browsing. I guess my current concern is more about privacy than safety. I want to be able to browse the internet without hackers, internet voyeurs, government spies, etc. watching my every move. I know completely blocking all of them is impossible, but how can I bring all this activity on their end down to a minimum? By trackers, I meant people who monitor the sites you visit and things you are looking up when you are online and visiting certain websites. I would appreciate everyones' help with this.


_________________
I know this great restaurant at the end of the universe.


Uprising
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 9 Jan 2012
Gender: Male
Posts: 3,908

13 Apr 2012, 4:27 pm

Alienboy wrote:
I am not only only worried about getting viruses amd malware,etc. I am also concerned about trackers on the websites I browse having people able to see what I am browsing. I guess my current concern is more about privacy than safety. I want to be able to browse the internet without hackers, internet voyeurs, government spies, etc. watching my every move. I know completely blocking all of them is impossible, but how can I bring all this activity on their end down to a minimum? By trackers, I meant people who monitor the sites you visit and things you are looking up when you are online and visiting certain websites. I would appreciate everyones' help with this.

Well I don't want to burst your bubble, but I think posts like this is what really attracts them to you. Like they can read you got something to hide.



Alienboy
Deinonychus
Deinonychus

User avatar

Joined: 22 Aug 2011
Gender: Male
Posts: 335
Location: The Goldilocks Zone

13 Apr 2012, 4:30 pm

Well I don't have anything to hide. I just think it is against my freedom to privacy and that it is unconstitutional for people to spy on what I am doing. It is not illegal and none of their business anyway. I guess I'm a "terrorist" now lol.


_________________
I know this great restaurant at the end of the universe.


Uprising
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 9 Jan 2012
Gender: Male
Posts: 3,908

13 Apr 2012, 4:56 pm

Alienboy wrote:
Well I don't have anything to hide. I just think it is against my freedom to privacy and that it is unconstitutional for people to spy on what I am doing. It is not illegal and none of their business anyway. I guess I'm a "terrorist" now lol.

Well towards the government we are all "terrorists".



Shorttail
Blue Jay
Blue Jay

User avatar

Joined: 3 Feb 2012
Age: 39
Gender: Male
Posts: 95
Location: Aarhus, Denmark

15 Apr 2012, 9:02 am

Alienboy wrote:
I just think it is against my freedom to privacy and that it is unconstitutional for people to spy on what I am doing. It is not illegal and none of their business anyway.

Use Tor. Download a bundle and get going in no time.



HoodedShadow
Sea Gull
Sea Gull

User avatar

Joined: 10 Jun 2011
Age: 34
Gender: Male
Posts: 209
Location: Finland

16 Apr 2012, 2:07 pm

Its not only trackers, cookies, web bugs/pixel tracking that see what you are doing, the server software (Apache, Ngix, etc) has logging which usually logs visitor IP addresses and pages they are viewing and that cannot be blocked by browser addons or such, only solution is either VPN or proxies.

If you want free and good quality proxy (aka other IP address than your own) you can use Tor browser bundle as Shorttail suggested.
If you want to hide more than just web browsing you should get (possibly pay for) VPN.

Also always remember to use HTTPS if possible, many websites have possibility for HTTPS but by default its off, easy browser addon to automatically switch and use HTTPS where available can be downloaded here (FireFox and Chrome): https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere
HTTPS encrypts the data exchanged between your browser (computer) and the website (server) so even if someone would be spying on you they would only see the encrypted data (eg. "1E0A4BEC2AB2E50EE8D6FAB10B282358
jUG7xb8mfQsuMTco45dAnw==" for word "test" ).


_________________
http://www.wrongplanet.net/postt164561.html - My introduction
Diagnosed aspergers
Email or PM me!
Email address: http://www.google.com/recaptcha/mailhid ... 0lSIA-uw==


bubbablacksheep
Emu Egg
Emu Egg

User avatar

Joined: 13 Apr 2012
Age: 40
Gender: Male
Posts: 5

21 Apr 2012, 3:38 am

you can be tracked across websites in several ways:

1. domain cookies
2. ip address and user agent
3. javascript
4. LSOs

off the top of my head. Tracking cookies can be defeated by adjusting you privacy settings or installing a cookie-blocker extension. Ip address tracking can be defeated by using tor or a distributed proxy.

Javascript is much harder to block because it runs on your local machine. they can imbed scripts that send the tracking website information just by you looking at the page, and they can get your ip using this round-about way. Also, javascript can reveal the exact dimensions of your browser window and other info, and they can pair this with your useragent, cookies, etc. to fingerprint your computer across websites. Last time I checked two years ago, the only way to beat javascript was to disable it completely, which makes the majority of modern websites stop functioning so good luck.

LSO (Local Shared Objects) are particularly nasty, these are "super cookies" used on sites like youtube that serve flash or javascript content, that place a file on your local machine. These 'super cookies' are not deleted when you clear out cookies, and most people are unaware that they even exist.

But yeah, back in the day, you could load up firefox with Tor, BetterPrivacy, Noscript, UserAgentSwitcher, foxyproxy with SOCKS, and a few others, and you were good to go.



HoodedShadow
Sea Gull
Sea Gull

User avatar

Joined: 10 Jun 2011
Age: 34
Gender: Male
Posts: 209
Location: Finland

21 Apr 2012, 6:06 pm

bubbablacksheep wrote:
Javascript is much harder to block because it runs on your local machine.

All modern browsers have setting to disable JavaScript or you can just download an addon to disable it, pretty simple and easy.


_________________
http://www.wrongplanet.net/postt164561.html - My introduction
Diagnosed aspergers
Email or PM me!
Email address: http://www.google.com/recaptcha/mailhid ... 0lSIA-uw==