Related threads: a world of spyware heartbleed bug and security recent news of gmail password leaks etc. samsung galaxy vulnerability - 600 million phones at risk
Any thoughts on decentralised vpn's/ decentralised networks where no one authority has control over the network. Everything is anonymously hosted on a web of machines
My updated recommendations (2024) for apps and browsers to escape the ubiquitous ad bombardment, primarily, and maintain a modicum of privacy, secondarily: New Pipe: Mobile app for accessing Youtube and a few other video hosting platforms. Best app around for watching videos, subscribing to channels, creating unlimited playlists. Can resume a video anytime - good for long lectures (and audiobooks). I haven been using it for about a year now - and its the best in class. Only once has it stops working - in the recent weeks, when YT was fooling around with their API - but they released new versions with fixes in a matter of days. For such times you can use: LibreTube, FreeTube, Tubular, Clipious. All mobile apps that access YT through the invidious servers - and so block all ads and native YT tracking. DuckDuckGo: A privacy focused browser for Mobile, a search engine for desktop (can also use browser extension) - the only search-engine recommended by EFF - the guys who maintain the Tor project On the mobile, the App provides an "App Tracking Protection" feature - which when enabled - catches apps red-handed in the act of sending data to who-knows-where and blocks tracking and alerts you of who is trying to steal what PII (personally identifiable information). I have been using this feature for months now - enabled it for all apps - and found no glitches whatsoever - WhatsApp, Telegram - included. The DuckDuckGo Email - a separate product - for generating disposable Email IDs to prevent unsolicited messages and tracking. You know those sites which require you to register for trial and then revoke access after a fixed number of days. Well, just shove a new DDG ID at them every time your access expires and you are on velvet. No need to go through the cumbersome process of creating a new Email account every few days. @abu Hasan @Aqdas Alert: Admins are kindly requested to ban all registrations with DDG IDs, we don't want people running multiple accounts and soliloquizing like Hamlet on our forums - especially the nefarious trolls who would love to create an impression of having the approbation of the "crowd ". StartPage Mostly same as DDG - mobile browser, search engine on desktop, browser extesnion But more importantly, it has a "browse anonymously" option for every search result - clicking on which will load the requested page in a kind of "sandbox" - i.e. - SP will fetch the page on their servers, strip it of all cookies and what-not and serve only the pure jam with a slice of bread. But there is a catch - you can't submit any kind of forms on the sanitized page - which means - you can't login, can't search a website etc. Think of it as "read-only" access. Actually, initially I could do both (on SP) - but someone got the wind of it and the bug or whatever it was got fixed - it stopped after a few weeks :/ Waterfox A privacy focused alternative to Firefox - it does not track you and it has its own DNS. Plus a nice vertical tabs feature like Vivaldi (another beautiful, hackable and purportedly privacy-friendly browser) and Opera (notorious Chinese spyware). My usual daily activity is to use: Waterfox + Startpage + uBlock Origin (safest ad blocker I know of) - and I rarely encounter ads in my browsing. In fact, I don't remember when was the last time an ad slapped me in the eyeball - it's that cool! ProtonMail Encrypted emailing service from the makers of ProtonVPN (no logs) - free for personal use. Portmaster This is a desktop app which lets you look through all the dirty laundry that any browser, website or app is smuggling under your nose - every single outbound network call is logged and exposed I have uninstalled quite a few apps after seeing who they were talking to behind my back! They also have their own DNS and ready-made block lists. I have blocked Meta for months and months - they don't provide anything useful anyway. Initially I also blocked Microsoft, Google and Amazon - but then some sites did not work well so had to re-enable them ..sigh.. But their core offering is an SPN - summat like VPN but with new identity per connection ... or something .... Brave Web Browser The only reason I am including it in the list is that it provides a "Private Window with Tor" option - so you don't need to start the Tor browser while doing regular work - you can just launch a Tor window with a click. The browser claims to be privacy friendly and that it does not track you - but it does dial back home on launch - so we can't be sure ... That's all for now!
plenty of info here. that's how they began. and it's not fool-proof. But unless one is using tor to access sites which are otherwise outlawed in their country, it is better than normal browsers. At the very least, it keeps unwanted targeted advertising at bay. I would recommend it to all sunni ulema and students. There are lot of nasty javascripts embedded in a lot of webpages, at-least they would be blocked.
I know that tor browesers are infested with cia and fbi agents, especially with regards to "dark web" content and commerce.
This is accurate -> Last chance to stop broadband companies from selling your full online record without permission. https://t.co/6FoFkaoGlY pic.twitter.com/uj129Iszxu— Jason Kint (@jason_kint) March 22, 2017 details. VPN is not safe either. Useful extension for browsers: HTTPS everywhere. fingerprinting.
