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The "privacy" provided by so-called private browsing mode is just a smokescreen considering how much device fingerprinting is going on. And widespread surveilla

The "privacy" provided by so-called private browsing mode is just a smokescreen considering how much device fingerprinting is going on. And widespread surveillance of the Internet backbone not just by intelligence agencies but now private organisations like Team Cymru. It would be better if we spent the resources on a next generation anonymity network to replace Tor, or some kind of alternative data transport like radio or satellite, which can still be used by small niche communities of free speech activists, for example... A one way data broadcasting system, sending compressed text only, provides near complete anonymity for those receiving it. However as it necessitates buying receiver hardware, it doesn't get very much traction.

kotlin2 4y ago
Firefox at least tries to restrict fingerprinting. For instance, you can force websites to require permissions to access canvas data.
- hn92726819 4y ago
  I haven't used chrome in years..does chrome really not allow limiting canvas data?
andrepd 4y ago
Firefox includes anti-fingerprint measures, and uBlock origin + advanced mode + all scripts blocked by default helps a lot. Also first-party isolation.
WallyFunk 4y ago
> The "privacy" provided by so-called private browsing mode is just a smokescreen And to add insult to injury, browsing artifacts are sometimes remembered in Windows' pagefile and other parts of the OS. Even on Linux, if your distro cares to add stuff to swap, it will dump browsing sessions in plaintext to your hard-drive, incognito/private mode or not. This is why people need to use TailsOS[0] if they're really concerned about not leaving any traces. [0] https://tails.net/ https://tails.net/
- yjftsjthsd-h 4y ago
  That's not really on the application, though; "the OS can write your RAM to disk" is outside of Firefox's control.
  - yjftsjthsd-h 4y ago
    Actually I have to add caveats to that. It looks like you could tell the OS not to swap your RAM using mlock/mlockall, but with significant caveats around overcommit that are a little over my head but which I suspect would be painful for a modern web browser to try and operate with.
insanitybit 4y ago
Brave has a TOR mode and Brave actually runs and contributes to TOR. I honestly think it's the only browser that's doing interesting, novel things to improve web browser tech anymore.

kotlin2 4y ago

Firefox at least tries to restrict fingerprinting. For instance, you can force websites to require permissions to access canvas data.

hn92726819 4y ago
I haven't used chrome in years..does chrome really not allow limiting canvas data?

andrepd 4y ago

Firefox includes anti-fingerprint measures, and uBlock origin + advanced mode + all scripts blocked by default helps a lot. Also first-party isolation.

WallyFunk 4y ago

> The "privacy" provided by so-called private browsing mode is just a smokescreen And to add insult to injury, browsing artifacts are sometimes remembered in Windows' pagefile and other parts of the OS. Even on Linux, if your distro cares to add stuff to swap, it will dump browsing sessions in plaintext to your hard-drive, incognito/private mode or not. This is why people need to use TailsOS[0] if they're really concerned about not leaving any traces. [0] https://tails.net/ https://tails.net/

yjftsjthsd-h 4y ago
That's not really on the application, though; "the OS can write your RAM to disk" is outside of Firefox's control.
- yjftsjthsd-h 4y ago
  Actually I have to add caveats to that. It looks like you could tell the OS not to swap your RAM using mlock/mlockall, but with significant caveats around overcommit that are a little over my head but which I suspect would be painful for a modern web browser to try and operate with.

insanitybit 4y ago

Brave has a TOR mode and Brave actually runs and contributes to TOR. I honestly think it's the only browser that's doing interesting, novel things to improve web browser tech anymore.