58 ms·

The New and Improved Privacy Badger 2.0 Is Here

75 points by Garbage 10y ago

SeanDav 10y ago
If ads did not track me, did not suddenly blast loud sounds at me, did not flash portions of the screen at me, did not open new windows or tabs, did not try hijack my machine or install malware and generally behaved like good net citizens, I would be quite comfortable with seeing ads in most areas.
- Flimm 10y ago
  The beauty of Privacy Badger is that it does not block ads, instead it blocks anything that could track, based not on a centralized list, but based on websites' behaviour.
- pmoriarty 10y ago
  Not me. I don't want to be manipulated by advertisers, even if they do so non-intrusively.
- commentzorro 10y ago
  Of course, then they wouldn't be nearly as effective. Catching your attention is the hallmark of an effective ad, even if done in an underhanded way.
Accacin 10y ago
I've moved to using Disconnect with uBlock Origin. Would there be an advantage to using Privacy Badger instead of Disconnect?
- acconrad 10y ago
  There is no point in using Disconnect if you have uBlock Origin. uBlock Origin has a set of filters in it's preferences that includes all of the filters from Disconnect. And you also do not need Privacy Badger if you have uBlock Origin. www.privacytools.io recommends all the browsers and add-ons you could need to stay safe and annoyance-free.
  - Accacin 10y ago
    That's the site I used to find out which addons I should be using. They used to recommend using Disconnect and uBlock Origin but I guess they've updated their info since I last read it. One less addon is always good news.
  - supergreg 10y ago
    I use uBlock Origin together with Privacy badger. It can block cookies for a domain while allowing you to load files, which I find useful, for example, for reading disqus comments in a website.
    - anc84 10y ago
      Give uMatrix a try!
      - patates 10y ago
        I also recommend uMatrix. Ridding all the cookies while allowing some resources with such granularity is very powerful. Also maybe scary for new users, but give it a week and its usefulness will be obvious.
      - tornadoboy55 10y ago
        Hasn't been ported to Safari (uBlock Origin has though, and if you turn on advanced-mode its pretty close to uMatrix).
    - stuaxo 10y ago
      I stopped using privacy badger, as in chrome some pages were taking about 30s to load with it. Hopefully they have fixed it now though, am on uBlock origin now.
tdkl 10y ago
User gitarr on reddit[1]: 1) Privacy Badger maintains a separate, plain-text list of every domain you've ever visited: https://github.com/EFForg/privacybadger/issues/1064 https://github.com/EFForg/privacybadger/issues/1064 2) Every time you start Firefox, Privacy Badger will connect to a IP on port 443. https://github.com/EFForg/privacybadger/issues/1065 https://github.com/EFForg/privacybadger/issues/1065 [1] https://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/5i7st0/the_new_and_improved_privacy_badger_20_is_here/db6curs/ https://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/5i7st0/the_new_and_i...
- StavrosK 10y ago
  How do we expect Privacy Badger to learn from domains we've visited if we won't let it store a list of domains we've visited?
  - peteretep 10y ago
    Hashing
    - StavrosK 10y ago
      Give me a hashed list of all the domains you've visited and I'll tell you how effective that is.
      - koliber 10y ago
        Could you not use an adaptive password hashing algo with an absurd iteration count. Let's say each hash takes 500ms. Salt each domain with a different salt. Building a rainbow table would still be possible, but hindered. To discover one domain behind one hash, you would need to roughly run through half of the used domains with the slow password hash. That being said, the subset of popular domains is much smaller then the full set of domains, so the problem can be pared down to be much more effective than the worst-case.
        StavrosK 10y ago
boobsbr 10y ago
So, as a completely uninformed user, what's the advantage of Privacy Badger over Ghostery? Or do they complement each other?
- feelslikefelt 10y ago
  Ghostery doesn't seem to be open-source.
- csmattryder 10y ago
  Ghostery should really be replaced/removed from your machine if you value privacy. I used to be a Ghostery user up until I realised they're playing gamekeeper and poacher. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghostery#Criticism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghostery#Criticism
- dabber 10y ago
  From the download page: "Although we like Disconnect, Adblock Plus, Ghostery and similar products [...] none of them are exactly what we were looking for. In our testing, all of them required some custom configuration to block non-consensual trackers." "algorithmic and policy methods for detecting and preventing non-consensual tracking" https://www.eff.org/privacybadger https://www.eff.org/privacybadger So I think the biggest difference is the algorithm it uses to "learn" what to block as you browse. Edit: Also, it doesn't block all ads. From the same source: "Because Privacy Badger is primarily a privacy tool, not an ad blocker. Our aim is not to block ads, but to prevent non-consensual invasions of people's privacy"
vilda 10y ago
Decentraleyes is worth mentioning. Also save some bandwidth. https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/decentraleyes/ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/decentraleyes...
- StavrosK 10y ago
  Isn't the point of these CDNs that you only have to make the request once, and then it's cached forever? What does decentraleyes buy you?
  - vilda 10y ago
    Few things - You request once _per CDN_. Common libraries are hosted on multiple CDNs and you may simply load them from multiple locations. For example jQuery is hosted by MaxCDN, Google, Microsoft, Cloudflare, jsdelivr. - Some CDNs may be temporarily down. It happened for me already multiple times, including Google CDN and Cloudflare CDN.
technojunkie 10y ago
I see that the new PB2 has a way to block and prevent WebRTC from leaking my IP. That's great. Can anyone understand if PB2's implementation is enough that I can uninstall this Chrome extension doing the same thing? https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/webrtc-network-limiter/npeicpdbkakmehahjeeohfdhnlpdklia https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/webrtc-network-lim...

75 points by Garbage 10y ago

If ads did not track me, did not suddenly blast loud sounds at me, did not flash portions of the screen at me, did not open new windows or tabs, did not try hijack my machine or install malware and generally behaved like good net citizens, I would be quite comfortable with seeing ads in most areas.

Flimm 10y ago
The beauty of Privacy Badger is that it does not block ads, instead it blocks anything that could track, based not on a centralized list, but based on websites' behaviour.
pmoriarty 10y ago
Not me. I don't want to be manipulated by advertisers, even if they do so non-intrusively.
commentzorro 10y ago
Of course, then they wouldn't be nearly as effective. Catching your attention is the hallmark of an effective ad, even if done in an underhanded way.

Accacin 10y ago

I've moved to using Disconnect with uBlock Origin. Would there be an advantage to using Privacy Badger instead of Disconnect?

acconrad 10y ago
There is no point in using Disconnect if you have uBlock Origin. uBlock Origin has a set of filters in it's preferences that includes all of the filters from Disconnect. And you also do not need Privacy Badger if you have uBlock Origin. www.privacytools.io recommends all the browsers and add-ons you could need to stay safe and annoyance-free.
- Accacin 10y ago
  That's the site I used to find out which addons I should be using. They used to recommend using Disconnect and uBlock Origin but I guess they've updated their info since I last read it. One less addon is always good news.
- supergreg 10y ago
  I use uBlock Origin together with Privacy badger. It can block cookies for a domain while allowing you to load files, which I find useful, for example, for reading disqus comments in a website.
  - anc84 10y ago
    Give uMatrix a try!
    - patates 10y ago
      I also recommend uMatrix. Ridding all the cookies while allowing some resources with such granularity is very powerful. Also maybe scary for new users, but give it a week and its usefulness will be obvious.
    - tornadoboy55 10y ago
      Hasn't been ported to Safari (uBlock Origin has though, and if you turn on advanced-mode its pretty close to uMatrix).
  - stuaxo 10y ago
    I stopped using privacy badger, as in chrome some pages were taking about 30s to load with it. Hopefully they have fixed it now though, am on uBlock origin now.

tdkl 10y ago

User gitarr on reddit[1]: 1) Privacy Badger maintains a separate, plain-text list of every domain you've ever visited: https://github.com/EFForg/privacybadger/issues/1064 https://github.com/EFForg/privacybadger/issues/1064 2) Every time you start Firefox, Privacy Badger will connect to a IP on port 443. https://github.com/EFForg/privacybadger/issues/1065 https://github.com/EFForg/privacybadger/issues/1065 [1] https://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/5i7st0/the_new_and_improved_privacy_badger_20_is_here/db6curs/ https://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/5i7st0/the_new_and_i...

StavrosK 10y ago
How do we expect Privacy Badger to learn from domains we've visited if we won't let it store a list of domains we've visited?
- peteretep 10y ago
  Hashing
  - StavrosK 10y ago
    Give me a hashed list of all the domains you've visited and I'll tell you how effective that is.
    - koliber 10y ago
      Could you not use an adaptive password hashing algo with an absurd iteration count. Let's say each hash takes 500ms. Salt each domain with a different salt. Building a rainbow table would still be possible, but hindered. To discover one domain behind one hash, you would need to roughly run through half of the used domains with the slow password hash. That being said, the subset of popular domains is much smaller then the full set of domains, so the problem can be pared down to be much more effective than the worst-case.
      - StavrosK 10y ago

boobsbr 10y ago

So, as a completely uninformed user, what's the advantage of Privacy Badger over Ghostery? Or do they complement each other?

feelslikefelt 10y ago
Ghostery doesn't seem to be open-source.
csmattryder 10y ago
Ghostery should really be replaced/removed from your machine if you value privacy. I used to be a Ghostery user up until I realised they're playing gamekeeper and poacher. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghostery#Criticism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghostery#Criticism
dabber 10y ago
From the download page: "Although we like Disconnect, Adblock Plus, Ghostery and similar products [...] none of them are exactly what we were looking for. In our testing, all of them required some custom configuration to block non-consensual trackers." "algorithmic and policy methods for detecting and preventing non-consensual tracking" https://www.eff.org/privacybadger https://www.eff.org/privacybadger So I think the biggest difference is the algorithm it uses to "learn" what to block as you browse. Edit: Also, it doesn't block all ads. From the same source: "Because Privacy Badger is primarily a privacy tool, not an ad blocker. Our aim is not to block ads, but to prevent non-consensual invasions of people's privacy"

vilda 10y ago

Decentraleyes is worth mentioning. Also save some bandwidth. https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/decentraleyes/ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/decentraleyes...

StavrosK 10y ago
Isn't the point of these CDNs that you only have to make the request once, and then it's cached forever? What does decentraleyes buy you?
- vilda 10y ago
  Few things - You request once _per CDN_. Common libraries are hosted on multiple CDNs and you may simply load them from multiple locations. For example jQuery is hosted by MaxCDN, Google, Microsoft, Cloudflare, jsdelivr. - Some CDNs may be temporarily down. It happened for me already multiple times, including Google CDN and Cloudflare CDN.

technojunkie 10y ago

I see that the new PB2 has a way to block and prevent WebRTC from leaking my IP. That's great. Can anyone understand if PB2's implementation is enough that I can uninstall this Chrome extension doing the same thing? https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/webrtc-network-limiter/npeicpdbkakmehahjeeohfdhnlpdklia https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/webrtc-network-lim...