One of you was shilling some time ago about how when it comes to browser you should either use Tor to not reveal any information about yourself or use stock firefox (because chrome is too much of a botnet) to not stand out the crowd when it comes to privacy. The argument is was that all add-ons, especially the privacy focused one, only make you easier to track and identify as the number of users who the same setup as yours.
What does the rest of Jow Forums say about this principle in general, not just in case of browsers? Could we be wrong about using niche linux distros, protonmail or cock.li, searx and startpage, customized waterfox and or other?
The downside would of course be that you'd possibly have to use more proprietary software, but I have to admit that it that idea doesn't sound stupid...
Anyone with simple understanding of information theory will tell you the same. Just think about it how many people run "ungoogled chromium/brave with those 10 add-ons and visit those exact websites at this time and day".
Now imagine what happens if you look like everybody else (i.e. Firefox with some config or Tor) ?
That is why it is non ironically better to load ads and trackers assuming you have a non unique fingerprint and also why Tor explicitly tells you to not install add-ons (including content blockers). Though with Firefox built in content blocker being enabled by default it will.make life easier for everyone.
Bentley Roberts
Using different Linux distros doesn't make a difference the difference lies in using Linux Mac or Windows at all. The web services you use are also irrelevant as long as they don't load external code (specifically looking at Google and Cloudflare) ie startpage and searx and cock are pretty safe.
Using any Browser but Tor or Firefox with resistFingerprinting flipped is just asking to be tracked. This becomes.even worse with browsers that promise.privacy (i.e. Brave Waterfox and ungoogled Chromium).
I don't get what is so hard to understand here. Imagine you run on a normal European city street as a 1.80m male dressed in all black with a scarf during winter (i.e. Tor) It is impossible to identify you without explicitly going to you (your device) and asking you.
Now imagine the same situation but you are 1.50m male naked but a neon green tshirt. How easy will it be to.identify you now?
Benjamin Moore
or, you know, use extensions to stop sites from data mining you? that's what they're made for. you only look like everyone else if you do what everyone else does on the web. i'd imagine there are a lot of edgelords here who do some questionable shit so it's a must for them to use privacy enhancing tools. personally, i don't want websites to predict what (((i'm looking for))) since i know what i want myself.
Jose Morgan
This is good advice in general, but it also depends on why you want to stay anonymous. If you're just trying to escape Big Data companies you want to stand out as little as possible. If you're trying to be a h4xor or do illegal shit you run smth like kali or tails and wipe your fucking disk regularly. And in that case using more obscure and especially foreign services (and especially outside any of the 14 eyes countries) can make it harder to track you too.
Retards will tell you to not use TOR because the "CIA/FBI has compromised exit nodes". I've never seen a source for this but to be fair it is absolutely plausible. However 1. TOR still offers better protection than other methods like a VPN, from which you can be de anonymized even by basic law enforcement 2. If you're trying to hide from those agencies by reading Jow Forums posts you're fucking fucked anyway, fucko
Ethan Howard
Both are wrong. You. cannot stop data mining. The fact that you use one of those add-ons is an entropy factor itself. The only way to stop data mining is to disable js and css. Which the website can read which again is an entropy factor. Imagine how many people worldwide surf with js and css disabled
Also for your second part. You look like everybody else by looking like Tor. Any other configuration will always stand out. Again read into tors explanation
Daniel Robinson
>missing the point this hard example >you do your "questionable shit" with all your shitty privacy extensions and autistic browsers >tracking services see someone with this exact setup do said questionable shit >use the exact same setup up to go to Facebook/Google/Youtube/Whatever >"Hey that guy has the exact same setup as the one doing that questionable shit earlier" You have now been de anonymized specifically because of the "privacy orientated" setup you use. If you there are 10000 people with your same setup doing that shit and 10000 login into facebook with it, it's impossible to make that connection.
>extensions to stop sites from data mining you? Memes. Not being able to track you can itself be used as an identifier. Beside, the people making the tracking algoriths have a million times more resources then whoever makes the extensions. It's an arms race and you are on the loosing side.
Ian Brown
>disable CSS Stopped reading there. You don't know what youre talking about.
Hudson Gomez
Stop coping and type "tracking with css" into your favourite search engine.
Aiden Johnson
You can disable stylesheets from loading in Firefox. This is because stylesheets can again be used to track you without JavaScript although in Firefox there is enough protection against it already anyway.
