this post was submitted on 03 Jul 2024

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Privacy

privacy@lemmy.ml

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A place to discuss privacy and freedom in the digital world.

Privacy has become a very important issue in modern society, with companies and governments constantly abusing their power, more and more people are waking up to the importance of digital privacy.

In this community everyone is welcome to post links and discuss topics related to privacy.

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Truly independent web browser (github.com)

submitted 2 years ago by Gargari@lemmy.ml to c/privacy@lemmy.ml

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[–] Lemongrab@lemmy.one 47 points 2 years ago (3 children)

Is this browser private? Does it implement proper sandboxing and have any methods of anti-fingerprinting? I hope it eventually see the implementation of a robust content blocker. What makes this related to privacy and not instead just open source. While it is nice to see an independent web engine, if there is no method of anti-fingerprinting, the privacy of this browser is severely limited.

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[–] Jumuta@sh.itjust.works 7 points 2 years ago (3 children)

oh yeah also js isn't very usable yet so that improves privacy

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[–] refalo@programming.dev 2 points 2 years ago*

To be fair, it is quite possible to fingerprint you pretty well without any JS at all, both inside and outside of html/css.

And disabling javascript is certainly something that not many people do, so already that makes you stand out even more.

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[–] MonkderDritte@feddit.de 1 point 2 years ago* (1 child)

Btw, how much of HTML features do they support yet? I found nothing googling.

Because, it's not that you support HTML 4 or 5 but how much of it. I think QtWebkit is still ahead of Blink and Gecko there, but less performant.

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[–] Jumuta@sh.itjust.works 2 points 2 years ago

idk, but from my testing pure html and css seem to work pretty well. it's just js that ladybird seems to have issues with

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[–] Lemongrab@lemmy.one 1 point 2 years ago

Lol, but also JS being volatile in the current browser makes it easier to fingerprint.

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[–] possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip 5 points 2 years ago (2 children)

It isn't done yet. They are targeting 2026

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[–] Lemongrab@lemmy.one 7 points 2 years ago (1 child)

My point exactly. It isn't ready and OP gave no context for why this relates to privacy. Better suited for the open source community on Lemmy.

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[–] possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip 2 points 2 years ago (1 child)

It is good for freedom of choice which ultimately is good for privacy

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[–] Lemongrab@lemmy.one 1 point 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (2 children)

All I was saying is it isn't ready for use as a browser, it states on the github that it is in pre-alpha. It doesn't have the threat model goal of protecting fingerprintable metrics. Using this over security and privacy hardened firefox, even in the future once all the web standards are supported, will worsen your privacy. There needs to be intentional development of anti-fingerprinting measures.

I like choice, this isn't ready and OP should have added more context then just a title and a github. This is not a privacy browser, this is a tech demo.

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[–] refalo@programming.dev 2 points 2 years ago (1 child)

I don't think anyone was trying to imply that it was ready. Of course once it gets more mature then things like privacy will likely start to become more integrated.

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[–] Lemongrab@lemmy.one 1 point 2 years ago (1 child)

Making a post in the privacy community with the tittle "truly independent browser" and a github link makes it seem that this project is related to privacy somehow. Nothing on the github has anything to do with privacy. There is no reason to believe the Dev has any intention to add privacy protection features. It is just another web engine. The only reason gecko has a lot of its anti fingerprinting is because of upstreamed features from the Tor browser, not because gecko's developers engineered them. So my question is still "how does this relate to the privacy community instead of the open source community".

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[–] refalo@programming.dev 2 points 2 years ago

I think some would consider the mere fact that it is independent, to be a positive for privacy in ways other than fingerprinting. I understand not everyone agrees, but I can see why some would think this.

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[–] possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip 0 points 2 years ago

I posted the website a while back. By the way they got more than a million dollars in funding and are looking for sponsors.

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[–] Dymonika@beehaw.org 1 point 2 years ago

*sets reminder now*

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[–] Jumuta@sh.itjust.works -2 points 2 years ago (1 child)

What makes this related to privacy and not instead just open source.

because it's not affected by google's anti-privacy decisions?

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[–] Lemongrab@lemmy.one 6 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (2 children)

That doesn't make it private. Privacy on the modern web requires anti-fingerprinting, otherwise any website with tracking scripts can easily start creating a shadow profile for you.

Edit:
What I mean is it isn't a browser anyone who cares about their privacy should use (yet or every depending on development). Not close to ready yet. OP didnt put any context either for why they posted it.

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[–] possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip 1 point 2 years ago

Come back in 10 years

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[–] Jumuta@sh.itjust.works 0 points 2 years ago (1 child)

fingerprinting won't be useful if every browser has google telemetry

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[–] Lemongrab@lemmy.one 4 points 2 years ago (1 child)

Firefox and chromium are open source. You can just remove mozilla and google telemetry during compile, or disable in the settings.

Fingerprint is 100% still useful even with telemetry. This is not a privacy browser and is still in early stages, volatile and easy to fingerprint (not even counting it is a different web engine and so has an even smaller userbase than Firefox). Also, a content blocker is good for cyber security, so regardless of fingerprinting, this is not ready for privacy-conscious people.

I made my original comment to add context about why this browser shouldnt be used if you care about privacy. If OP had said "this is a promising new independent player in the browser world, look forward to seeing what they do in the future when its more stable" I wouldnt have said anything.

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[–] Jumuta@sh.itjust.works 1 point 2 years ago (1 child)

Firefox and chromium are open source. You can just remove mozilla and google telemetry during compile, or disable in the settings.

no you can't if the entire web runs on a whitelist system that requires the google telemetry, like what google is trying to do with shit like web integrity. you need a sizeable independent browser so that google isn't 70% of the market share like it is now. obvs you can't trust apple to do this because safari is a piece of shit and people only use it because it's the only option, and they'd obviously follow google if it meant more profit. mozilla might do something about it, but their funding is pretty sus.

i understand ladybird isn't good for privacy at the moment, but we're gonna really need it for privacy in the future

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[–] Lemongrab@lemmy.one 1 point 2 years ago (1 child)

The only reason Firefox still has any market share is probably because it is old enough. I highly doubt this browser will ever stop google forcing a new web standard. We need to educate the general users to make better tech decisions if we want change. We can stay hopeful about this engine. Still would have liked it if servo was getting more development.

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[–] Jumuta@sh.itjust.works 1 point 2 years ago (1 child)

I'm very doubtful that educating general users will work, unless they're being educated by people they really trust like family members. whatever they're educated on will be wiped off by companies like google running a giant advertisement campaign or some subconscious annoyance that makes free software projects seem bad (things like what yt is doing with adblocking and stuttering)

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[–] Lemongrab@lemmy.one 2 points 2 years ago (1 child)

Yes, by educating I mostly mean word of mouth. But also sharing of user friendly guides like PrivacyGuides. An alternative browser can only disrupt Google's control on the web by gaining significant market share, which requires convincing and converting users to the better software alternatives to Chromium. We must educate because we are the tech educated minority, and we require the assistance of the majority to oppose googles unilateral control. I think Gecko is a better option to put development time behind (or better yet Servo), or abandoning many of the privacy invasive web standards and creating a new internet (which of course would never see wide use).

TLDR: We need the majority to be more educated about tech or things will keep getting worse regardless of a new browser engine or anything else.

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[–] Jumuta@sh.itjust.works 1 point 2 years ago

I agree, though I tried out Servo and Ladybird yesterday, and Ladybird seems much more complete although Servo was much more performant. Maybe Servo is more complete in the background, but Ladybird seems more complete from my eyes as a naive outsider.

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