I have seen many people in this community either talking about switching to Brave, or people who are actively using Brave. I would like to remind people that Brave browser (and by extension their search engine) is not privacy-centric whatsoever.
Brave was already ousted as spyware in the past and the company has made many decisions that are questionable at best. For example, Brave made a cryptocurrency which they then added to a rewards program that is built into the browser to encourage you to enable ads that are controlled by Brave.
Edit: Please be aware that the spyware article on Brave (and the rest of the browsers on the site) is outdated and may not reflect the browser as it is today.
After creating this cryptocurrency and rewards program, they started inserting affiliate codes into URL’s. Prior to this they had faked fundraising for popular social media creators.
Do these decisions seem like ones a company that cares about their users (and by extension their privacy) would make? I’d say the answer is a very clear no.
One last thing, Brave illegally promoted an eToro affiliate program making a fortune from its users who will likely lose their money.
Edit: To the people commenting saying how Brave has a good out-of-the-box experience compared to other browsers, yes, it does. However, this is not a warning for your average person, this is a warning for people who actively care about their privacy and don’t mind configuring their browser to maximize said privacy.
Brave is literally a grift. Too many people are falling for it.
I turn on youtube and see no ads
Just use uBlock Origin.
What are the better solutions for iOS users?
As I stated in a previous post, if you are using an iPhone you’ve basically given up on having privacy. For ad blockers you could use AdGuard and Safari, it’s better than nothing. You could also use something like Mullvad VPN, it has DNS ad blocking.
That’s the most ridiculous statement I’ve seen today. iOS has infinitely better privacy than Android lawl
An iPhone is a give-up on privacy because you don’t get alternatives. If you don’t like your stock OS on an Android phone you can just switch OS (for example GrapheneOS, CalyxOS, ect.). If you don’t like the normal YouTube app you can just sideload a different one. You don’t get this kind of freedom with an iPhone. A prime example of this is when, during the Hong Kong Riots where Apple pulled an app that assisted protesters.
As I stated in a previous post, I am using AdGuard on safari. And since I’ve basically given up on privacy, I also use Brave at times.
Someone mentioned Firefox Focus.
Firefox focus doesn’t seem to save open windows, it’s a purely incognito browser. & you can only have one page open at a time.
You’re right about the first part; it’s an incognito, tracker & ad blocking browser that clears your history and everything every time you close it… but if you long press on a link, you can open it in a new tab. Multiple, even. There’s just no option I’ve found to open a blank new tab and navigate to a website that way. So I totally understand why you’d think that!
(I hope this doesn’t come off as pedantic or rude or anything. That’s definitely not my intention here - I just want people to be able to make informed decisions with correct information, ya feel?)
Focus does indeed block YT ads!
Even safari with Wipr does not. Though it is amazing for everything else.
I haven’t tried it but there’s also Kagi’s Orion browser which looks interesting.
Thanks I didn’t know about that one and I thought I went through all the alternatives. Currently I’m primarily watching YouTube vids through invidious in safari but will use brave when I watch my saved playlists.
Honestly had no idea this existed, cool!
Sideloading either Yatee or uYou+
Or use Piped as a PWA
This is why I use Brave on iOS devices. It is the best option I found. Others mention Adguard home and pihole. They just don’t work as well at blocking ads.
Brave is not spyware. That website you linked is horrible and full of misinformation. They also claim that Firefox, and even Tor Browser, are spyware. They act as if any and all connections a browser makes are automatically bad and used for spying/tracking.
I won’t disagree with the other criticisms of Brave that you made, but just wanted to point that out. That website is just highly unreliable and makes verifiably false claims about the browsers it reviews.
Just commenting to let you know I’ve clarified a bit in the post. Also, stock Firefox is spyware so.
Stock as in out-of-the-box.
Edit: If you want to downvote this go ahead, but at least know that it’s true. Without changing ANY settings, Firefox is spyware.
Just stop giving any advice please.
Never heard of that. Please do not just claim things without clarifying.
It’s a well known fact that Firefox is full of telemetry that you need to turn off. There’s a reason for so many user.js files and forks existing.
Brave is not spyware
It is officially spyware now: https://www.ghacks.net/2023/10/18/brave-is-installing-vpn-services-without-user-consent/
Let’s not forget one of the biggest investors is a right-wing billionaire who runs a corporate intelligence agency that contracts with the DoD. And the only proof we have that he doesn’t collect data on Brave’s users is the questionable word of the devs.
Brave has been off limits for me ever since I saw my QAnon nutjob father using it lol.
That’s dumb.
Would you stop drinking water just because Hitler drank it too?
I would appreciate if we don’t bring politics into the conversation. They are completely subjective and only serve to stray away from the original point.
Edit:
Yes, I’m aware I’m in the wrong here.
Privacy is a political subject.
To be fair, nearly everything is/ has been/ can be a political topic. Two of the more ridiculous ones (IMO) I can think of are video games and D&D.
Please educate me. Why is it political?
Because governments and corporations all over the world are trying to hollow out privacy?
- Omega_Haxors ( @Omega_Haxors@lemmy.ml ) 2•1 year ago
Easy. You put your personal shit on the internet then after you get into an argument with a groyped up nazi, they look up your information which is easily accessible and know more about you than a close friend would. You’re starting to get a little harassment but you’re quick to block, but it just keeps coming and coming and coming. Eventually they find out that you’re like 0.00001% jewish then lie about your family history as justification to take things to the next level. You get constant death threats until one faithful day one of them shows up at your doorstep to lynch you. They shoot you dead and the cops let them off the hook because of course they do. All because you freely posted all your personal information on the internet for any freak to see.
Think that’s an extreme example? It literally happens all the time. The only reason I’m still around is because I keep that shit private so it never gets past the first step, but there’s been plenty of others who weren’t so lucky when it came to that sort of thing.
I would appreciate it if conservatives stopped trying to strip away our rights, including the right to privacy.
Same but it is relevant that there is bipartisan support for stripping away our rights to privacy and general tech/internet freedoms.
Of course it is! But Peter Thiel isn’t bipartisan, so idk what that has to do with his involvement in Brave. He self-identifies as far-right. Not leftist, liberal, or independent. And since we’re talking specifically about Brave and Thiel, I don’t really care about whataboutism in this context.
I don’t see how you can acknowledge this being relevant but also consider it whataboutism, those seem like opposite positions. If it is whataboutism, that’s a claim that it isn’t relevant. It is relevant because partisan affiliation is not a reliable predictor of how someone will approach this issue, which matters for whether considering it in this context makes sense.
Politics are as subjective as the right to privacy. There isn’t a hard logical truth to it, it’s what people think is moral. Considering that, and considering that right-wing billionaires aren’t known for being friendly to privacy, I think it’s fine to bring politics into this discussion.
- Omega_Haxors ( @Omega_Haxors@lemmy.ml ) 4•1 year ago
You are aware that “Don’t bring politics into this” is code for “I don’t agree with what you’re saying” right? It’s never a good look.
For the comments, can anyone give me an actual reason to use Brave over Firefox (and it’s forks)? I guess the cryptocurrency aspect is a reason, but I wouldn’t say it’s a very good one.
That’s actually one of the reasons I do not use Brave.
My guess is because Brave is a relatively known Chromium browser that’s been degoogled. Along with built in ad and tracker blocking, and it’s an easy less evil of the two.
I want to like Firefox, both as normal user and as web developer, but something about it keeps bugging me. The UI feels sluggish, sites seem to be slightly less performant, and I can’t seem to get used to it.
That said, I’ve started using Vivaldi, and while it can be considered bloated, I really like the tab options it has, while also offering a degoogled chromium that’s being kept to date.
Because all the web devs optimize for chrome because they dominate the market. If more people use Firefox then devs will start to care about performance in it
(You’re a dev so I assume you know this. This comment is mainly for other people)
I’m not sure what it is. I suppose this is the case for the heavier web-applications, but the average website (which is where my expertise is, not actual applications) also feels slightly worse on FF. And as far as I know, I don’t use any chrome-specific tricks or optimizations.
I want to like Firefox, both as normal user and as web developer, but something about it keeps bugging me. The UI feels sluggish, sites seem to be slightly less performant, and I can’t seem to get used to it.
I feel the exact same. I use linux with a tiling window manager and when I change format, Firefox just starts twitching like it’s trying to give me an epileptic seizure while chromium browsers do it just fine.
Also, sometime ago I tried to compare Chrome (when I still used it) and Firefox side by side with the same extensions opening the same websites and Firefox always took a bit more ram.
You sure that’s not a WM problem?
FWIW, Ubuntu 20.04, i3wm, no problems with Firefox
Idk, I use gnome with pop shell tiling and Firefox is the only program that does it.
Try another WM and see if you still have issues
For me, Vivaldi had had the best performance next to Safari. FF and Chrome are easily smoked by Vivaldi when benchmarking. Idk if it’s related to M-series chipset or what, but my buddy who doesn’t have one has much worse performance on his laptop. Also, web and software dev, the saved workspaces that you can pin is killer.
Being chromium based it
- has better performance
- has less bugs
- has better standards compatibility
Don’t get me wrong, I am using Firefox, but your entire post is pretty disingenuous. Criticizing Brave over privacy concerns and then suggesting Firefox instead requires disingenuity or a special kind of ignorance and/or stupidity. Firefox has had 10 times as many privacy “mishaps” as Brave with all the “experiments” of corporate affiliates they shipped to users unannounced. There’s a reason there are so many forks of Firefox.
Pretty much everything you criticize about Brave is entirely optional.
Then you title a link as Brave “getting ousted as spyware”, and the linked to page does not oust Brave as spyware at all. You would do good to adopt some of the more neutral/factual tone of that page.
And in parts that page is pretty ridiculous, too: complaining about what is set as the default search engine (the same as Firefox, btw). Who the fuck cares what search engine is set by default? Just change it. Opt out of everything you do not like. If there’s stuff you cannot opt out of which is bad, we can talk about that. But arguing about optional features is ridiculous.
Edit: little add-on: Brave factually has better out of the box (no plugins) privacy protection than Firefox: https://privacytests.org/
None of those three are true.
Some web sites are optimized for chrome.
Not remotely accurate, https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/list
Not to any relevant degree. 515 VS 528 is at best a slight difference that in all likely hood is from Googlie using their position to strong arm things that benefit only them into the standards and very likely undetectable by the end user. https://html5test.com/I stated “and it’s forks” in the comment, and I did not mention Firefox (or any other browser) in the actual main post itself. Firefox can be easily de-spyware’d with something like arkenfox’s user.js (as I mentioned in another comment). There are also plenty of privacy-centric Chromium based browsers such as Ungoogled Chromium and Vivaldi.
Regarding optional features, I more used them as a segue into the last three links showcasing Brave’s malicious and downright illegal activities. Personally, the fact those features are integrated into the browser at all is a deal breaker for me.
Edit: For the record, I’m aware Vivaldi is proprietary but I don’t necessarily think that makes it bad. I haven’t done enough research on it to personally recommend it, but I’ve been told that it’s good.
Funny how you do not address most of what I said … so, disingenuous it is.
Regarding optional features, I more used them as a
seguered herring into the last three linksftfy
Nothing good will come of this conversation, so I’ll stop it right here. Have a nice day.
Funny how you do not address most of what I said … so, disingenuous it is.
I don’t address most of what you said because it’s referring to one of the six links I have in that post, and I don’t really have anything to say regarding it.
I don’t see how it is misleading to tell people that Brave created a cryptocurrency, they then added a rewards program to the browser with that cryptocurrency, and then they inserted affiliate links into URL’s when people were browsing. All of this happened, it’s not misleading, it’s just a fact.
That website you link is literally run by a Brave employee. Sure, they might have tried very hard to be independent, but when you literally work on the codebase of one browser you’re probably going to write your tests to focus on the things you already know (plus it’s not like Brave would allow their employee to run a site that says it’s shit, would they?)
Considering how many tests Brave does not pass, I’d say that page looks pretty balanced and fair. Also it is consistent with independent studies where Brave came out on top of the list.
My impression is that most opposition against Brave is largely political. And then people try to find technical reasons after the fact, which simply isn’t justified in comparison with other browsers.
By “political” do you mean that the boss is a knob? Because that’s pretty irrelevant to the quality of the browser as you say, though all the dodgy things they do like lying about donation money and injecting affiliate links are not.
Brave is better out of the box than Firefox
Not by much…
And an iPhone is better for privacy out of the box than most Android phones, but once you make some basic changes that’s no longer the case.
I have installed Brave on my grandparents’ computer, because:
- They had only used chrome, so brave is more familiar than firefox.
- Less chance of something not working/loading properly.
Personally I use firefox.
Defaults. Install Brave and you’re done. Site doesn’t work? Report non-working site. Wanna support creators? Top up your Brave Wallet or turn on Brave ads.
I’ve a limited budget and limited time to tip websites. I ain’t gonna tip manually every other rando on the internet. Brave takes care of that. Small amounts, yes, but better than just ad-blocking [yes, website owners have to opt-in to it].
Completely uninformed take follows: Also, Mozilla seems to be trying to ramp up their ads department – search for Mozilla Ads. And no-one gonna convert because they already have Google Adsense.
TL;DR: Firefox is faster but using recommended tools like uBlock Origin leaves websites without income.
You can always use something like AdNauseam to give website owners ad revenue and still block ads.
I don’t use brave, but I use Vivaldi.
The main reason for me is native mouse gestures. They are so much better than addon mouse gestures.
And speed dials. Addon ones are okayish, but I prefer the Vivaldi implementation.
If Firefox would ever ass native mouse gestures, I would swap in an instant. Until then, no can do :(
Personally I can’t say anything about Vivaldi, but it’s proprietary and owned by people who used to work for Opera.
-
Proprietary, yes, from a Foss pov it’s not good I guess
-
Owned by ex opera ppl: that’s a good thing tbh. Old opera was fantastic. New opera is more fishy after they were acquired by a Chinese group.
There is a lot of browser love in Vivaldi tbh. They are very open and transparent. Haven’t found a single red flag about Vivaldi (aside from not being FOSS, which for me isn’t a red flag per se)
They even run their own Mastodon servers for their community ;)
Proprietary software is generally frowned upon in this community, however I personally don’t mind that much.
-
The only reason I use it over firefox is about tab grouping and how tab mutting work by default. I don’t feel like trying out a bunch of extensions to find one that does what I already get from another browser. Also don’t have to worry about installing ad blocker. Originally switched because it worked better than uorigin for a specific use-case that was relevant for me. I also have vivaldi, firefox, and librewolf install and will use them occasionally. Privacy isn’t a big concern for me though; when I tried to switch to librewolf, the privacy features ended up annoying me so I disabled a lot of them because they interfered with using the browser how I wanted.
Not recommending Brave. I agree at least in theory with using Firefox and I want more people to use Firefox. But its what I’m use to and there was reason for me to try it out at the time I switched to it (that’s probably irrelevant now).
Due to some specific hardware issue on my end affecting all firefox based browsers, I have to use a hardened and stripped down version of Flatpak Brave, which I did manually, as a backup browser. I used to use Ungoogled Chromium but it is not reliable. Other than that there is absolutely no reason to use Brave and I would immediately switch back to Firefox only if I get newer hardware.
As a plus point, firefox (gecko based browsers in general) are the only ones I have seen which provide the best theming flexibilities.
Have you tried any forks of Firefox? They might serve you better. You could also try out Mullvad’s browser, which released a few months ago.
I have tried a wide number of Firefox Forks, some niche ones as well. I generally do not prefer non-ESR releases or Forks because of the added Fingerprinting Risks. But all of them had the same issue so I concluded that there was some incompatibility with my Hardware (which is quite old now) and the Gecko Engine.
I already wrote in another comment, but since you’re asking here, I’ll add i to this thread:
You probably shouldn’t use Brave over Firefox (and it’s forks), at least not as a primary browser, but it’s a great out of the box plug and play browser for average people, most of which are probably currently using chrome with no ad block.
If the average user was decently tech literate, companies wouldn’t buy ads any more, because they wouldn’t make anything off of them, since people don’t watch; but obviously they do.
The average person doesn’t want to have to install an ad-blocker - hell, the average person probably has no real idea of what an ad-blocker even is - and they don’t want to bother configuring anything either. They just want plug and play applications that will do everything they need. And for that, Brave is probably the best. E.g. if a family member called me asking for a browser recommendation, I’d probably just tell them to install Brave. I think I’ll keep doing that until I see a better plug and play browser.
On iOS, unlike Android, Firefox doesn’t come with extensions. No ads are blocked. Even if I use Safari and Adguard extension, it doesn’t block YouTube ads. Brave works like a charm in this regard. I’ve opted out of all telemetry stuff that I could find, and btw even Firefox opts into everything by default. Any other open source browser you can suggest that blocks ads including YouTube on iOS?
On iOS use Orion Browser by Kagi. As for blocking ads in YouTube, you can use AltStore to sideload a YouTube app with sponsorblock and ad block built in.
(Orion might block YouTube ads, I haven’t tested it)
I can confirm Orion blocks Youtube ads (might need to tweak options). As for youtube app, no need to sideload anything, Yattee is on the app store and on testflight for betas (https://github.com/yattee/yattee/wiki/Installation-Instructions)
- Included TOR browsing
- Included IPFS
Built in Tor browsing… Just use Tor?
… or just use the built-in feature of my browser and don’t require running another software?
Doesn’t that kinda defeat half of Tors purpose though? Tor works best when you have a large crowd that all looks the same. Using Brave or any other browsers makes you stick out like a sore thumb because most likely not many people do this. This is the reason why the Tor people recommend only ever using the Tor browser and also not install any other extensions onto it and so on.
If you don’t care about that, that’s fine but then you don’t really need Tor either way.
Interesting take. I guess I need to check for more details if Brave hides these infos or not. Thanks for that hint!
I don’t think Brave can “hide” these infos. At most you could try to spoof them somehow to something else. If you would hide them, that inherently would make you stick out as well since the website would see that you’re hiding stuff :D
You would have to make your Brave browser look exactly like the Tor browser from a websites point of view to blend in. No clue if that is actually possible. A website can read surprisingly a lot of system information from your browser.
Chromium exensions
This falls under “not a good reason” because 90% of Chromium extensions have Firefox alternatives.
I don’t want to support Mozilla, for a lot of reason I don’t have the time or the will to discuss here. Is that enough for you? It is for me.
You either support Google or support Mozilla. Supporting Mozilla leads to a safer internet for all.
It’s cute how people sincerely believe Mozilla PR.
I don’t believe Mozilla PR, I believe that solely using Chromium is bad for everyone.
Ok. Nice. I’ll keep using Brave anyway. Have a good day.
My man joins the conversation and then acts like they’re a hostage to it.
Stupid conversations, stemming from stupid premises, are not going anywhere.
I use it on my phone and tablet to block YouTube ads. All the other browsers are dedicated for various other purposes, but I use Firefox as my main browser. When a site doesn’t work on FF, I have to use Safari. Brave is just another tool in my toolbox.
If nothing else, I would recommend Firefox over Brave for the sole reason of the latter being yet another Chromium browser. It would be nice if we could eat away some of the browser marketshare from Google.
Personally I agree with the OP; and I refuse to use Brave. This isn’t based in dislike of cryptocurrency in general; but I DESPISE both ADVERTISING AND SHITCOINS (Basically any token or sub-token of a main standalone blockchain that has no real, significant, usable real world value).
Therefore Brave DOES NOT reflect my values. I don’t care if advertising networks make any money, I actively hate them enough I want to deprive them due to their behaviors anyway for being so violently anti-user.
I don’t use Chrome or Brave because they DO NOT reflect my beliefs regarding web standards either, and I refuse to allow Google and the Chromium and Chrome project to dictate standards either. Particularly of note is their utter failure with both FLOC and WEB-INTEGRITY; both of which are stupidly retarded anti-user and anti-privacy features which are horrible.
Web Integrity might be the worst Google thing yet
If someone can help me fix a major issue I have with Firefox I’d love to switch.
I heavily use the per-application sound volume in pipewire on my Linux PC.
Firefox will reset whatever volume I have set as soon as I pause a video and resume it a couple seconds later.
I have a deej board and use that to control the application volumes.
Firefox makes it simply unusable for me…its a known bug and Mozilla just doesn’t give a fuck…
Does this also occur with Firefox forks? They might have fixed it.
Only used fire dragon and it shows the same
The issue is wider than Brave. Nowadays, companies build uncritical communities around their products.
If you try to be critical, you loose the community in which you’re involved on one side. And, if you are critical from the outside, “you don’t understand” like in the “you’re not the choose one”.
Why are there daily posts against Brave but not against other browsers? Is Google more trustworthy than Brave?
Because people in this community already know not to use Google Chrome and Microsoft.
daily posts against Brave
Also, where are these daily posts? Personally I haven’t seen any saying “don’t use Brave” which is why I made this post in the first place.
I have been browsing /new since about a week and this is the third anti-brave submission that I see there.
I see all too many recommendations to use Brave in comments so a post like this is of value.
I mean it’s a free forum, you can make one if you want to.
I don’t object the creation. I just want to know why there is that discrepancy.
“The devil you know” and all that.
I see this exact thread every week now and it’s between the same people:
“Oh ok i stopped using it” to “Naw i’ll keep using brave”
At this point can we stop this? Brave is trash but people are either too stubborn or just don’t care anymore (which is ironic). Either mods just pin this thread and treat this as a “brave is trash” megathread or I don’t know.
I made this post because people in this community were suggesting Brave as a privacy focused browser. As far as I’m aware, no other post like this exists in this community specifically.
Fair enough. I respect the response. I’ve just been seeing some of the same threads throughout my time on lemmy and its essientially the same responses generally from brave users (which is their choice). Its not fully a waste but at this point the mods should just pin this thread.
I don’t think this thread is detailed enough to be pinned, but thanks.
- Hot Saucerman ( @dingus@lemmy.ml ) English27•1 year ago
making (presumably) thousands of dollars off their users
I agree with this post completely but for some reason you finishing with this makes me chuckle.
Oh no! Thousands! They might be able to pay rent for a month or two!
I’m just being cheeky, and while its true what they did was scummy, it also feels like a really… smallish amount of money?
If we’re literally just talking thousands, and not tens of thousands, or hundreds of thousands.
But yeah, fuck Brave.
Firefox gang and Hardened Firefox gang here to stay.
Mozilla’s got its own problems but that’s a story for another day.
Well thousands could mean hundreds of thousands or tens of thousands. I kept it small because I can’t really give a real number.
- Hot Saucerman ( @dingus@lemmy.ml ) English10•1 year ago
That’s fair, but in that case you might just say “they likely profited handsomely off this venture” or something similar, because if you reach for dollar amounts like that, it can kind of undermine your point.
Well the issue I linked to said “making a fortune from its users who will likely lose their money.” and I didn’t want to just copy it word-for-word. I don’t think it hurt my point that much, but it definitely could have been worded better.
- Hot Saucerman ( @dingus@lemmy.ml ) English4•1 year ago
Oh for sure, it didn’t undermine your point excessively, just a little, I was mostly just being cheeky, just how it read to me. As I said, I agree with all the things you’re saying. Cheers!
Guess what, Firefox also gets the same score on ghis site :)
https://spyware.neocities.org/articles/firefox
Also they both seem to be the better option to Chrome https://spyware.neocities.org/articles/chrome
Not sure if this score applies to vanilla Chromium.
Firefox gets a high rating on default configuration.
The next line explains that with custom configuration, it becomes Not Spyware.
Yes they both get the same score, but Firefox also has a mitigation guide to make it Not Spyware.
That website is very bad and full of verifiably false information, they act as if any and all connections a browser makes are automatically bad and “spying”. They even claim that Tor Browser is a “spyware”.
That website is […] full of verifiably false information
Could you please provide and example or two? I wish to verify it, since I didn’t notice any last time I checked the site.
they act as if any and all [unprompted] connections a browser makes are automatically bad and “spying”.
They’re very clear that this is their approach (bold text on the home page). Even if you disagree with their definition, that doesn’t make the site bad. And there are many valid situations where a threat model should be this strict, consider anti-government activists in any country.
They even claim that Tor Browser is a “spyware”.
It says “Not Spyware”. https://spyware.neocities.org/articles/tor
Could you please provide and example or two? I wish to verify it, since I didn’t notice any last time I checked the site.
Sure, let’s look at the page for Firefox. They claim that there are “Automatic connections to some websites you’ve visited, including their trackers” with the new tab page, and that they “couldn’t find a way to disable it.” Whoever made this website couldn’t take 2 seconds to go to about:preferences and see the option to display recently visited sites?
They also have a section titled “Firefox tracks users with Google Analytics”, which they’re very misleading about. Instead of explaining that GA is only present in about:addons and that it can easily be disabled, they’re extremely vague about it and just blindly say it “sends analytics to Google”, which would lead people to believe its much worse than it actually is (i.e. Chrome level). There’s an important distinction between: “Google Analytics is present on 1 page in the browser and can be disabled” vs. vaguely stating “Firefox send analytics to Google” without full info or context. Hopefully I’m explaining that well enough.
Its also disingenuous to consider Firefox’s Captive Portal as “phoning home” without, again, providing full info or context. It has a legitimate purpose, to allow users to connect to public networks, and can be disabled for those who wish to do so. It doesn’t give any data to Mozilla, all it does is detect if a captive portal is present. I think this is another instance of the context being important to have, which the website just simply doesn’t give.
Another instance, look at their page on Tor Browser, where they just flat out lie and accuse Tor Browser of “sending telemetry”.
I could go through more, but these are a few I notice immediately that I take issue with.
They’re very clear that this is their approach (bold text on the home page). Even if you disagree with their definition, that doesn’t make the site bad.
Categorizing something as spyware solely based on the number of connections it makes is horribly irresponsible at best and dangerous at worst. Whoever made this couldn’t even be bothered to find what data is actually being exchanged for most of these connections. There’s a lot more to determine how privacy invasive something is then just sitting and counting the number of connections it makes, and treating them all as malicious and for “tracking”.
And there are many valid situations where a threat model should be this strict, consider anti-government activists in any country.
That’s why this website is so dangerous. Calling Tor Browser spyware and saying it sends telemetry could trick people who don’t know better to use worse alternatives. This even moreso extends to casual users too, who could also be misled into using a less private browser as a result of this website’s insane claims.
It says “Not Spyware”. https://spyware.neocities.org/articles/tor
They have a separate article up calling it spyware as well, see here. Weird contradiction from them and just shows this site isn’t very well designed or thought out.
Thanks for the detailed reply :)
I agree with all your points, it is misleading and potentially harmful to use a strong term like spyware to refer to all of those things, without further context. I guess I’m still used to a couple of tech circles where people would jokingly throw ‘spyware’ around to describe anything and everything, so I didn’t realize how misleading it really is. Especially when it’s applied to things like automatic updates, which only the most extreme security models consider more of a risk than a security feature.
Let me put it in this way – if Firefox were really a spyware, TOR browser won’t be based on Firefox.
That’s not the best argument tbh, bc you van remove all the spyware from brave AND Firefox sooooo
Tbf Tor is based on US military software. Could be a honeypot lol. But it’s the best we’ve got…
That website has a very strict, unusual interpretation of ‘spyware’. Even if all the telemetry and unprompted connections made by Mozilla Firefox are in good faith and legitimate features, that website still labels it ‘spyware’, as it is revealing unnecessary information without your consent.
The same website gives Tor Browser a ‘Not Spyware’ rating, as it (necessarily!) removed the default features of Firefox that concerned them.
Side note - I think you may have accidentally marked your account as a ‘bot account’ in the settings.
Might I add brave’s BAT wallet is garbage. You had to sign up to some random exchange and upload your ID (I didn’t), but even that you couldn’t even backup your wallet into a new install, so hope that you would never have to format or reinstall or change devices - it’ll be a pain to restore, if it was even possible.
Firefox over brave any day.
I used them for a few weeks before they rolled out their crypto scheme. It honestly felt like they monetized “privacy”, nothing more. So I bailed having zero faith any of their shit worked like they wanted us to think it works.
They monetized their users, and that wasn’t the first time they tried.
Um, so does every other major web browser company
I’m finding it hard to see Brave as major.
Look, just… just use fire fox! Sure some sights aren’t optimized for it, but it’s a minor difference in performance from a chromium based browser.
And the more people use fire fox the more sights will have a reason to optimize for it.
Anything that is using chromium is still using something built by Google, and thus if Google tries to alter chromium to make ad blockers stop working, or some other asinine idea, there isn’t much a browser can do about it.
Use librewolf instead of Firefox to get rid of the whole spyware part of it. Librewolf only has a single request when starting, to “check for updates”. But using Firefox is the second best thing you can do both for your privacy and to fight Google’s " Web Environment Integrity" crap.
I personally use Librewolf, can agree with this.
What would you use for Android phones?
Mull is pretty good from what I’ve heard. I think GrapheneOS comes with it’s own browser built in.
mull or fennec
Firefox is also really good on Android these days. I use that with all the usual ad blocking and privacy extensions I have on desktop.
and 80% of firefox’s revenue is JUST Google. we are fighting an uphill battle here
