Web Browser Privacy

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Cynllo

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This post is a brief guide to help users increase their online anonymity by using more private and multiple browsers. Many facets about you can be determined to track you across multiple sites based on browser characteristics. The goal is to use more private browsers to protect your identity, and more than one browser to split your IP address and fingerprint across browsing activities.

Time needed to improve your browser security: 10 minutes - 2 hours (depending on extent).

LibreWolf

LibreWolf is a FireFox based-browser and the gold standard of privacy-oriented desktop browsers. It disables quite a lot of functionality and heavily blocks spyware and potential spyware. The result is that some sites might not work (properly). That is more so the case with eCommerce sites and payment gateways. You are also likely to get more captchas using this browser, as it disables ways captcha services use to determine if you are a bot. It also completely disables your web cam and microphone.

I would recommend using this for your main browser for work and general browsing.

Download: https://librewolf.net/installation/

Recommended settings, which will clear all browsing data when the browser is closed:

(optional, recommended) Settings->General->Make default browser
Settings->General->Use your operating system settings for “[Language]” to format dates, times, numbers, and measurements
(optional, customisable) Settings->General->Save files to - desktop
Settings->general->Network settings->Enable DNS over HTTPS - 149.112.112.112 [a no log DNS server]
Search->Default search engine - Recommended you add: Yandex, Presearch and Searx.be (see this guide); do not use Google, Yahoo/Bing or DuckDuckGo
Privacy->Ask to save logins and passwords for websites
Privacy->Autofill logins and passwords
Privacy->Cookies and site data->Tick 'Delete cookies and site data when LibreWolf is closed'
Privacy->Cookies and site data->Manage Exceptions:
[enter the domains of sites you'd always like to be logged into and save browsing data, e.g. zerohedge.com]
Privacy->HTTP only mode->Don’t enable HTTPS-Only Mode
In the address bar navigate to: about:config - and search for and set the following values:
docshell.shistory.bfcache.allow_unload_listeners = true
docshell.shistory.bfcache.ship_allow_beforeunload_listeners = true
dom.disable_beforeunload = false
Click to expand...

Install the following addons:

LocalCDN - https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/addon/localcdn-fork-of-decentraleyes/ - replaces commonly used files like emojis and JavaScript from sites that are hosted by 3rd parties like CloudFlare. This can expose your IP.

LibRerect - https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/addon/libredirect/ - replaces access and embeds to popular sites like YouTube and Twitter with privacy-respecting alternatives. This requires some configuration, which will be covered in another thread.

I Still Don't Care About Cookies - https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/istilldontcareaboutcookies/ - stops annoying cookie popups.

AMP2HTML - https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/amp2html/ - Google has tried to induce sites to host their content on Google servers. This plugin will redirect you away from those.

Secondary Browser

You should use a secondary browser for your online dissident activities and posting. So as to separate your general browsing IP(s) from you dissident IP(s). During your normal browsing (using LibreWolf) your browser will likely be accessing websites that are major security flaws like Google, YouTube, Facebook, CloudFlare, Instagram etc. If you never use those sites, you will still be accessing them in some manner. If you use the same IP and browser to access dissident sites, you will probably be leaking your IP, possibly linking your identity to your dissident activities. For example if you watch YouTube videos via YouTube and then watch embeds on this forum via YouTube. To get around this, install a second browser that has a different footprint and install a browser addon VPN to give it a different IP.

It doesn't matter too much what your secondary browser is, so long as it's not out-of-the-box Firefox, Google Chrome, IE/Edge or Safari. Here are some other browsers to consider for your secondary, tertiary, etc. browser(s):

Brave - https://brave.com/ (Chromium)
Bromite - https://www.bromite.org/ (Chromium)
Ungoogled Chromium - https://github.com/ungoogled-software/ungoogled-chromium - (Chromium)
Decentr - https://decentr.net/ (Chromium)
Mulvad - https://mullvad.net/en/download/browser/windows (Firefox)
Tempest - https://www.tempest.com/browser (Chromium)
Waterfox - https://www.waterfox.net/download/ (Firefox)
Standard Firefox - https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/new/ - (Firefox), but follow this setup

* The name in bracket after the URL is the base browser. You can broadly use the above LibreWolf guide for Firefox-based browsers and the below Brave guide for Chomium-based browsers.

Once you've downloaded Brave, configure it as follows:

(optional) Settings->Appearance->Wide address bar
(optional, recommended) Settings->Appearance->Always show full URLs
(optional) Settings->Appearance->Show tab search button [off]
Settings->Shields->Advanced view
Settings->Shields->Trackers and ad blocking [aggressive]
Settings->Shields->Social blocking [disable Google and Facebook]
Settings->Privacy [Disable P3A and daily usage ping]
Settings->Privacy->Clear browsing data->On exit [select all except 'Passwords and other sign-in data' and 'Site and shields settings' and save]
Settings->Privacy->Cookies and other site data->Sites that can never use cookies [Add: [*.]google.com, [*.]bing.com, [*.]facebook.com, [*.]twitter.com, [*.]linkedin.com, [*.]yahoo.com, [*.]youtube.com]
Settings->Privacy->Security [Customized -> http://149.112.112.112/]
Settings->Search engine->Manage search engines [Add Yandex, Presearch and Searx.be; delete other engines; see this guide]
Settings->Extensions->Hangouts [off]
(optional) Navigate to - brave://settings/downloads - to change the default download location
Navigate to - brave://rewards/ - turn off Brave Rewards
Click to expand...

LibRedirect - https://libredirect.github.io/download_chromium.html
LocalCDN - https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/localcdn/njdfdhgcmkocbgbhcioffdbicglldapd
AMP2HTML - https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/redirect-amp-to-html/kifkmmpiicbcnkjaliilaoeaojlldonl
I Still Don't Care About Cookies - https://chrome.google.com/webstore/...bout-c/edibdbjcniadpccecjdfdjjppcpchdlm?hl=eN

VeePN - https://chrome.google.com/webstore/...vpn-p/majdfhpaihoncoakbjgbdhglocklcgno?hl=en- - this is a VPN that works from your browser. This generally gets round most national VPN blocks. It is free, but I would recommend getting the paid version, which is about $100 for 5 years. Install it in every of your secondary, tertiary, etc. browsers and have each use a VPN server in a differnt country. This will split your different browsing activities across different IPs, making it largely impossible to track you.

Tertiary Browser+

If you happen to have user for major spyware sites like Google, Facebook, Instagram etc., setup a different browser with the VeePN addon in each browser to create the desire divisions. As an example, my setup is:

LibreWolf: general personal and work
Browser 2: dissident
Browser 3: work Google logins, not used for anything else
Browser 4: another work browser only used for one site
Browser 5: browser for sites that break in LibreWolf

Note that the above setup configures Chromium-based browser to delete all your browsing data. If you want a browser to always keep you logged into certain sites and save relevant data, you'll need to remove this step:

Settings->Privacy->Clear browsing data->On exit [select all except 'Passwords and other sign-in data' and 'Site and shields settings' and save]
Click to expand...

Firefox-based browsers are better for remaining logged in, as they allow you to scrub data on exit, other than whitelisted sites. That's these lines:

Privacy->Cookies and site data->Tick 'Delete cookies and site data when LibreWolf is closed'
Privacy->Cookies and site data->Manage Exceptions:
[enter the domains of sites you'd always like to be logged into and save browsing data, e.g. zerohedge.com]
Click to expand...

Also, make sure to install the VeePN addon for Firefox-based browsers, which was not included above.

Once you set them up it's worth saving all the settings files for them, so you can back them up as needed.

Mobile Browser

This will be covered in more detail elsewhere, but as a note: Mull & Fennec (require deGoogled Android), Carbon and Brave (on Android).
 
This is a great guide.

Whenever I use a web browser, sometimes I'll monitor its activity while its sitting there doing nothing.

LibreWolf: This one was great for a couple of releases, then suddenly last year, I noticed one of the official builds to be communicating with an obscure IP address. I made sure it wasn't an extension/safebrowsing/telemetry and that pinging was absent from prior builds. Suffice it to say that I lost trust in it and moved on. That's not to say it's not a great browser today, just that I do not like it when web browsers become chatty on their own and when not in use.

Waterfox: This was new to me. So I put it through my tests - no matter the telemetry and pings disabled in about:config, it still wants to ping the developers' servers, some Cloudflare addresses, and Mozilla servers. A well configured and hardened instance of Firefox doesn't even do that. Needless to say, Waterfox did not last very long today.

A quick note on Fennec on Android: It doesn't really need a deGoogled or rooted Android build. It installs and runs just fine on standard Android. Of course, anything with Google on is a privacy nightmare in and of itself, but wanted to clarify for others reading that a rooted device is not required for Fennec to install and work. One of the highlights of Fennec is that it gives you access to the full about:config on mobile, something that regular Android Firefox does not.
 
Narekatsi said:
LibreWolf: This one was great for a couple of releases, then suddenly last year, I noticed one of the official builds to be communicating with an obscure IP address.
Click to expand...

From your tests, what would you say are the best browsers for privacy? I haven't run these tests, but saw a reference to an EFF project that has tested browsers and Tempest came out very well.
 
Cynllo said:
From your tests, what would you say are the best browsers for privacy? I haven't run these tests, but saw a reference to an EFF project that has tested browsers and Tempest came out very well.
Click to expand...

Strictly from a network communication perspective, a tightly configured/hardened instance of standard Firefox (whether consumer or ESR) will pretty much sit there silently and only communicate with the network addresses of websites being browsed. I haven't really noticed anything suspicious. Obviously I don't monitor my web browsers 24/7, but the random reviews that I do, usually catch the sneaky ones.

As for Tempest, I think it must have instantly reminded me of Brave, which is why I didn't spend any time on it. If I feel adventurous and have the time to look into it, I'll come back here with my own results.
 
I always just assume that I have zero privacy online. I think having an expectation of privacy is a bit naive when our devices have hardware backdoors baked right in from the factory. I can certainly understand and appreciate efforts made to preserve privacy, however, especially from those who live in countries where you can get arrested for posting wrongthink.
 
Narekatsi said:
Strictly from a network communication perspective, a tightly configured/hardened instance of standard Firefox (whether consumer or ESR) will pretty much sit there silently and only communicate with the network addresses of websites being browsed. I haven't really noticed anything suspicious. Obviously I don't monitor my web browsers 24/7, but the random reviews that I do, usually catch the sneaky ones.

As for Tempest, I think it must have instantly reminded me of Brave, which is why I didn't spend any time on it. If I feel adventurous and have the time to look into it, I'll come back here with my own results.
Click to expand...

Do you have anything to add to this setup for Firefox - https://github.com/TheFrenchGhosty/TheFrenchGhostys-Ultimate-Firefox-Configuration - ?
 
Cynllo said:
Do you have anything to add to this setup for Firefox - https://github.com/TheFrenchGhosty/TheFrenchGhostys-Ultimate-Firefox-Configuration - ?
Click to expand...

Looks like that assumes LibreWolf as its base, which comes with a lot of settings already set. On a standard Firefox install, this would be a good start: https://chrisx.xyz/blog/yet-another-firefox-hardening-guide/ (archived guide is the last link). Then the extensions from the French Ghost guide can come in (Decentraleyes, etc.)
 
Can anyone help here? I use several different browsers and with extensions for ad blocking, privacy, etc. What I've run into for a while now, but is finally bugging me (no pun intended) to the max is the obnoxious use of hard disk that Brave does, which I see many others complain about. I think it is writing random information to the disk for no good reason. Should I just go to LibreWolf? If I do watch youtube videos on the Brave browser, they are typically finance related. The constant delays of Brave and fan action is beyond annoying at this point.
 
My take echoes this comment 100%

I always just assume that I have zero privacy online.
Click to expand...

Beside the hardware back door, another key issue is you really don't know how much to trust a vpn. You'd probably need some seriously knowledgeable personal contacts to determine whether any vpn exists that does the kind of thing many people use it for. The most my current online privacy regimen accomplishes is to make it mildly inconvenient for someone to try and trace my activity.

There is some really good info in this thread already, thank you all. I keep Pale Moon as my second browser, it works well most of the time. Some web sites do not work right, and finding the site script controls I am accustomed to in Firefox is a real challenge, but the team updating it do a good job keeping it functional.

I too have been astounded by the poor performance of Brave, after giving it a fresh try several times since its release, on both Windows 7 and Windows 10 machines. Having a browser that hangs like that, and often just slows to a crawl, is like a return to 1997. Fantastic concept behind it, with all the cool privacy stuff and extra functions, but I just cannot get it to work right, so always end up uninstalling it.

That "Dissenter" browser that Torba created, a chromium fork, was excellent, but he gave up on it after about a year.
 
Narekatsi said:
Looks like that assumes LibreWolf as its base
Click to expand...

Bird said:
This is my latest configuration
Click to expand...

StanWildman said:
but I just cannot get it to work right, so always end up uninstalling it.
Click to expand...

I've quoted you guys because a lot of this is Windows to some degree, and might be Defender or the malware portion (that service executable thing that looks like it hates Brave). It has calmed down this morning, but I think with multiple tabs and/or yt vids it tends to act up. Should I uninstall and reinstall Brave? Should I use another antivirus because the Windows Defender nonsense is always going to act up? Or just go to LibreWolf or some other browser and see? The issue is that it will tend to always go back towards 100% cpu/disk usage, and fan. Of course, I have to wait a bit on startup but I'm not sure if that's related, or just a dumb/slow Win10 thing that everyone is used to.

Thanks.
 
StanWildman said:
You'd probably need some seriously knowledgeable personal contacts to determine whether any vpn exists
Click to expand...

Planning on a thread on VPNs. But the gold standard is IVPN.

We can see that Tor is secure, as when the Feds have tired to find people who are using Tor, they've always had to rely on them making some error, letting some info slip. I seem to remember they got Ross Ulbrecht (Silk Road) because he initially made a post with his email somewhere when Silk Road was just started. They must have spent six figures or more, via multiple agencies to find him and it wasn't relating to VPN or Tor issues.

As you say, being difficult to find is what will be good for most people. Being easy to find by logging into this site with a residential IP with the same browser you use to login to Facebook, Google and using your personal email to register with this site make it much easier for automated apparatus. See - https://christisking.cc/threads/avoiding-deep-state-corporate-data-harvesting.272/

Also, with VPNs it would be best to use a server location that is in a country that won't co-operate with authoritise in your country, e.g. Russia. But I think there are many good ones in EE.

In 2013, it was suggested that the NSA' facility in Utah (one of at least two currently that monitor the internet) could hold about 1 trillion terabytes. You want to do your best to stay out of there with identifiable info. Presumably, persecution for not being a leftist-globalist is going to increase.

countries-part-of-5-eyes-9-eyes-and-14-eyes-infographic.png
 
I might make the switch to Firefox over Brave, but the scrolling on Firefox bugs me endlessly. I have a script on Linux to make scrolling faster, and for some reason it bugs Firefox. I have no clue how to make the scrolling similar to Chromium based browsers, if it's even an option.

StanWildman said:
You'd probably need some seriously knowledgeable personal contacts to determine whether any vpn exists that does the kind of thing many people use it for.
Click to expand...
I'd keep one around just for changing locations. I was gifted Minecraft a few weeks ago and could only redeem it after turning on a US VPN. No joke.
 
I'm a be frank here and just say that I don't believe that true anonymity is even possible on the internet anymore. Just about everything we use requires some kind of footprint.

VPNs can be subpoenaed and they most definitely won't protect you. (Not to mention that I think that VPNs are just honeypots). TOR was created by the feds and I'm sure they keep track of which device downloads the software.

Trust me, I went down this rabbit hole a while ago. It's all a matter of how bad do the feds want to come after you. You will never truly be anonymous.

The real question is why do we need to be online that much to begin with? To consume media? That's wasteful and to use this forum can be reduced to 15 minutes on McDonald's wifi.

The majority of human history was lived without the internet, I don't think being anonymous on the web is the pressing issue, but being on the web too much is.

God bless you all on your journey!
 
TheSurveyor said:
Trust me, I went down this rabbit hole a while ago. It's all a matter of how bad do the feds want to come after you. You will never truly be anonymous.
Click to expand...
I've come to this realization too. In other realms too; the truth is that even cash is traceable (it has numbers) if they really want to come after you. The point is that irrelevancy is the best part of anonymity. Or if you are "wealthy" just take steps so that few or no one will know it.

One thing that is real in the new world of data collection and tracking is that you can do certain things that make the following if you and what you do A LOT harder, that is, don't be low hanging fruit. Many people will give up if you happen to be one of the few(er) who didn't make things easily connectable in the first place. This confirms your original point, which is, are you a person of interest at all and how bad do they wanna know or how much energy do they want to put into finding X out about you.
 
TheSurveyor said:
I'm a be frank here and just say that I don't believe that true anonymity is even possible on the internet anymore. Just about everything we use requires some kind of footprint.

VPNs can be subpoenaed and they most definitely won't protect you. (Not to mention that I think that VPNs are just honeypots). TOR was created by the feds and I'm sure they keep track of which device downloads the software.

Trust me, I went down this rabbit hole a while ago. It's all a matter of how bad do the feds want to come after you. You will never truly be anonymous.

The real question is why do we need to be online that much to begin with? To consume media? That's wasteful and to use this forum can be reduced to 15 minutes on McDonald's wifi.

The majority of human history was lived without the internet, I don't think being anonymous on the web is the pressing issue, but being on the web too much is.

God bless you all on your journey!
Click to expand...

The main point is to not be browsing nude, so to speak. See this thread, and consider it 10 years out of date. If you are browsing around the net in normie mode, logged into Google, Facebook and others - your activity is being bound to your name.

You are going to need to present a serious threat for them to find you if you are using basic opsec. For a VPN use iVPN. Use a VPN in a server with low data retention and little to no spy infrastructure, like Moldova.

If you do that and just post your views here, the chances of you being identified by a hostile party are essentially zero. A normie internet user coming on this site - it will likely be very easy for the NSA to identify them.

See the Ross Ulbrecht situation above. For the most aggressive authorities to find someone with high op sec will require they slip up.


Going forward it's going to be increasingly useful to be anon. Have a look what WEF and leftists and others have in plan for us. Many university professors have to sign alliances to radical leftists ideology to have a job. It's not going to stop there.

- Use a VPN
- Use an email setup as outlined in that thread
- Split browsing as mentioned here

It's not difficult.

To illustrate. So far on this site:

- one user doxed themselves in a screenshot (delete)
- one user who rage quit over peanuts and began attacking the forum - used their personal email address to sign up - identity located
- one user is using an IP owned by their small business - identity located

Also consider, no site can guarantee it won't be hacked. Some time ago the membership list for the British National Party was leaked. People lost their jobs. We can expect more of this as we descent into a clown-cashless control grid society.

Only a few small steps to give yourself good protection from such things and stop/reduce your data being hovered up as mentioned in the above-linked thread.
 
Cynllo said:
The main point is to not be browsing nude, so to speak. See this thread, and consider it 10 years out of date. If you are browsing around the net in normie mode, logged into Google, Facebook and others - your activity is being bound to your name.

You are going to need to present a serious threat for them to find you if you are using basic opsec. For a VPN use iVPN. Use a VPN in a server with low data retention and little to no spy infrastructure, like Moldova.

If you do that and just post your views here, the chances of you being identified by a hostile party are essentially zero. A normie internet user coming on this site - it will likely be very easy for the NSA to identify them.

See the Ross Ulbrecht situation above. For the most aggressive authorities to find someone with high op sec will require they slip up.


Going forward it's going to be increasingly useful to be anon. Have a look what WEF and leftists and others have in plan for us. Many university professors have to sign alliances to radical leftists ideology to have a job. It's not going to stop there.

- Use a VPN
- Use an email setup as outlined in that thread
- Split browsing as mentioned here

It's not difficult.

To illustrate. So far on this site:

- one user doxed themselves in a screenshot (delete)
- one user who rage quit over peanuts and began attacking the forum - used their personal email address to sign up - identity located
- one user is using an IP owned by their small business - identity located

Also consider, no site can guarantee it won't be hacked. Some time ago the membership list for the British National Party was leaked. People lost their jobs. We can expect more of this as we descent into a clown-cashless control grid society.

Only a few small steps to give yourself good protection from such things and stop/reduce your data being hovered up as mentioned in the above-linked thread.
Click to expand...
That's a fair take I suppose, meta data might be the best reason to try to stay "anonymous". Marketing teams are pretty effective if they know what you like
 
I've been a macOS bro for a long time, and have been mostly happy with Orion by Kagi. Native, vertical tabs, content-blocking built-in, and zero telemetry, but not open source and in beta for years, with all the bugs that come along with that. However, the ability to use extensions from both the Chrome Web Store and Mozilla Addons is nice (of course knowing that the promise of providing support for all those extensions is going to lead to bugs).
 
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