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Browser bliss...
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Posted by satis
Oct 17, 2023 at 07:48 PM
I use Brave, and I’m happy with it, but that review shortchanges the power of Mullvad’s browser anonymization, which is significantly better than Brave’s. Not only that the review misunderstands what the Mullvad browser does, listing it as “tailored for VPN use” is not just wrong but meaningless.
I supplement Brave’s built-in ad blocking with uBlock Origin, and I also use several privacy-related extensions (Cookie Autodelete, Decentraleyes, minerblock, pixelblock and others) but my browsing habits can still be tracked based on my unique installed fonts, the OS platform I’m using, my window size(s), screen resolution, time zone and offset, etc—all of which Mullvad addresses, only some of which Brave randomizes.
If you look at the chart at https://privacytests.org/ you’ll see that Mullvad mostly matches Brave in the many categories listed, but pulls away in the cross-session third-party tracking tests.
Using Brave, the Privacy.net analyzer determined:
40.24% of observed browsers are Chrome 118, as yours.
13.24% of observed browsers run Mac, as yours.
0.00% of observed browsers run Mac 10.15, as yours.
62.95% % of observed browsers have set “en"as their primary language, as yours.
4.98% % of observed browsers have UTC-04:00 as their timezone, as yours.
And https://coveryourtracks.eff.org/ says the Brave browser has
Bits of identifying information: 8.65
One in x browsers have this value: 402.71
One in 400 makes me sufficiently unique and therefore susceptible to tracking and building a files on my habits.
Now using Mullvad, the Privacy.net analyzer determined:
Your browser is Firefox 115 and resolution is set to 1400x1200. (NOT TRUE)
42.35% of observed browsers are Firefox 115, as yours.
13.24% of observed browsers run Mac, as yours.
0.00% of observed browsers run Mac 10.15, as yours.
62.95% % of observed browsers have set “en"as their primary language, as yours.
0.00% % of observed browsers have UTC-00:00 as their timezone, as yours.
The only thing it got right was that I was using a Mac, but it got the version wrong. (Same for the Brave test.) But Brave gave up more real information.
And https://coveryourtracks.eff.org/ says the Mullvad browser has
Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; rv:109.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/115.0
Bits of identifying information: 5.72
One in x browsers have this value: 52.7
Bits of identifying information: 1.95
One in x browsers have this value: 3.87
Since Mullvad falsified this, and randomizes results over time, privacy is much more secure.
Posted by Barrage
Oct 20, 2023 at 01:03 AM
Very thorough, very helpful.
Thank you very much!
Posted by Anthony
Oct 23, 2023 at 08:31 AM
>> - Brave, best for all-round privacy
No one is perfect though. As it has been discovered it installs, in the present version at least, two not required Vpn Services in your Win system, to be used in case you subscribe its Vpn service. But it does so in any case, even when you do not subscribe its Vpn service at all.
Posted by Dellu
Oct 23, 2023 at 02:13 PM
This is very interesting satis.
I didn’t try the new browsers. But, what I like about Brave, in contrast to other methods, such as privacy addons in Firefox, is that many websites do not seem to know that their adds are getting blocked by Brave. Websites that show popups about blocking their adds (while using Adblock Origin), do not do so in Brave. That is very good.
I don’t know that could be the case with the other browsers you mentioned.