In this video I show you how to install ungoogled chromium, and some of the benefits of using ungoogled chromium.Download ungoogled chromium herehttps://gith.

1. Ungoogled Chromium Browser Windows 10
2. Download Google Chrome

Ungoogled Chromium is a great privacy-focused Chromium based browser. It is fast, stripped of Google's proprietary coding that can intrude on your privacy, and compatible with many Chrome Extensions. Ungoogled-chromium is a free and open-source Chromium-based web browser with the aim of increasing privacy. The developers behind the project describe it as 'Google Chromium, sans dependency on Google web services'. Unlike many Chromium-based browsers, ungoogled-chromium tries to retain the default Chromium experience.

In a world overrun with snoops of all types, everyone needs a secure and private browser. Here are the ones to consider… and the ones to avoid.

The internet has come a long way since its humble, text-only beginnings. One of the milestones was the creation of the first web browser and web server by Tim Berners-Lee. These led to a huge increase in the use of the internet. Unfortunately, all these users also attracted people who want access to all that personal information, and will do whatever it takes to get their hands on it. As the F-Secure website points out:

Attackers typically target the web browser to either hijack or snoop on the web traffic from it, or exploit it to access the device itself, and the files saved on it.

A secure browser will, to the extent possible, prevent attackers from hijacking it, snooping on traffic from it, or exploiting it to get access to the device running the browser. There are many ways that browser security can be attacked, and the details are too extensive to talk about here. For a good (slightly dated) overview of the situation, you can visit the Securing Your Web Browser page on the US government’s Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) website.

Securing your browser is vitally important, but it is only half of the battle. Your browser must also protect your privacy. A secure browser is of little use if you have to surrender your privacy to use it. A good example of a browser that has strong security but weak privacy is Google Chrome.

Ungoogled Chromium Browser Windows 10

Google makes sure that their browser is secure, and is constantly upgrading its defenses. However, Google makes much of its money from selling targeted ads. Between the company’s reputation for, um, infringing on people’s privacy online, and the fact that the browser is not open source, it would be silly to think that your privacy is protected when you use Chrome.

What this means for us is that while security is our number one priority (this site isn’t called SecurityTech for nothing!), we will not recommend any secure browsers that don’t also protect your privacy. So let’s get right into it.

The most secure browsers that also protect your privacy

How did we choose the browsers to feature here? We considered several factors, including:

• Does the browser resist being hijacked, keep your data safe from snoops, and resist online exploits? (Is it secure?)
• What personal information does the browser collect? Who does it share that information with? (Is it private?)
• Does it have a development team that publishes upgrades and bug fixes? (Is it well supported?)
• Can it display pages without glitches or bugs? Does it support current internet standards like HTML5? (Does it work?)
• Bonus points for browsers that have a range of desktop and mobile clients (Can I use it on all my devices?)

The ultimate goal of this article is to identify a variety of secure, private web browsers for you. From there, it is on you to choose the browser or browsers that work best for your circumstances.

Based on research and testing, these are the most secure and private browsers:

1. Firefox Browser

Firefox is our #1 recommendation when the subject is the best secure and private browser. It ticks all the boxes for the factors that make a great secure web browser.

Is Firefox secure?

In addition to standard security features like using HTTPS to communicate with websites, and submitting automatic “do not track” requests to websites, Firefox security features include:

• Open source code that has been audited for security.
• A Security Bug Bounty program that rewards outside researchers for finding bugs in Firefox.
• Tracker protection that blocks malicious websites from discovering where you go while online. This includes the relatively new, advanced tracking technique called redirect tracking, or bounce tracking.
• DNS over HTTPS (also known as DoH). Normally, DNS queries from a web browser go over an unencrypted connection to a DNS server controlled by your ISP. This lets your ISP see where you go on the internet. This is a privacy disaster when you consider that ISPs in countries like the US can do anything they want with this data, including sell it on the open market. DoH encrypts your DNS queries and sends them to a privacy-protecting DNS service. DoH plugs one of the major security leaks that most browsers are still subject to.

Is Firefox private?

By default, Firefox offers decent privacy protection. Mozilla, the publisher of Firefox collects as little data about you and your activities as possible. As a non-profit organization they don’t have the pressure to collect and sell your data that a for-profit company like Google would.

And that’s not all. With a little work, you can harden Firefox to turn its privacy rating from decent to excellent. Mozilla, the publisher of Firefox, offers an extensive guide to hardening Firefox on their Protect your privacy page.

Is Firefox well supported?

Firefox is definitely well supported. As one of the most popular web browsers in the world, it is backed by a large, active development team that publishes new versions constantly. To give you some idea, the day when we wrote this article at the end of October, 2020, the latest Firefox Desktop version was 82.0.2. If you go to this page, you can see what version they are currently on. You might be surprised how many new versions have hit the net since then.

Download Google Chrome

Does Firefox work?

Given the large team of developers constantly rolling out updates, it should come as no surprise that Firefox supports all the latest internet standards and works well. You should be aware that some Firefox privacy and security options could break websites that use technologies which are security risks. But this is a tradeoff that you will run into with any secure browser, not a Firefox-specific problem.

Can you use Firefox on all your devices?

The odds are excellent that you will be able to use Firefox anywhere you want to use a web browser. Mozilla offers desktop support for Windows, MacOS, and Linux computers. Nnxt auto map samples.

Mobile support is available for iOS and Android devices. These are new versions of Firefox with powerful security and privacy features like built-in tracker blocking, malicious ad blocking, and a private browsing mode.

There are also specialized versions like Firefox Browser for Enterprise, Firefox Reality (a version optimized for virtual reality), and Firefox for Fire TV.

For our money, Firefox is the secure browser to beat. But keep reading to learn about some worthy challengers.

https://www.mozilla.org/firefox

2. Tor browser

The Tor browser is a specialized, open-source version of Firefox. It is designed to connect to the internet through the Tor anonymity network, a worldwide network of servers designed to make it difficult to associate specific activities on the internet with specific users.

Is the Tor browser secure? Is it private?

Tor is very secure. The Tor browser comes configured in a standard manner that makes it resistant to browser fingerprinting. It also prevents scripts from running, and deletes cookies, your browsing history, and any other data whenever you close the browser.

Note that you can compromise the security of the Tor browser by installing additional add-ons or plugins.

The Tor browser comes out of the box configured for strong privacy protection. Exactly how strong that privacy protection is in normal use depends in part on whether the Tor network is as secure and private as it is commonly believed to be.

As with the security of the browser, you can compromise the privacy of the Tor browser by installing additional add-ons or plugins.

Does the Tor browser work? Is it well supported?

The Tor browser does work well. However, some of its security features, such as blocking all scripts, mean that it will not work with some websites that rely on features Tor blocks.

The Tor browser is back by the Tor Project, a well-funded, US non-profit organization. The team consists of around 90 technical people and a board of directors currently led by internationally-known security expert Bruce Schneier.

A related issue is the Tor anonymity network itself. It is indisputably slow. But there are also concerns arising from US government funding of Tor, reports of malicious exit nodes, and even rumors that the network itself has been compromised.

Can you use the Tor browser on all your devices?

The Tor browser is available for Windows, OS X, Linux, and Android. You can download the Android app from the Google Play store, F-Droid, or in .apk form directly from the Tor Project website.

https://www.torproject.org/

3. Brave browser

Based on the open source Chromium browser, the Brave browser gives you security and privacy without requiring any tweaks or adjustments. It has great built-in features like Brave Shields, systems for blocking ads, trackers, malicious websites, and third-party cookies. And let’s not forget automatically upgrading security to HTTPS wherever possible and attempting to prevent browser fingerprinting.

Is the Brave browser secure? Is it private?

Brave comes pre-configured to provide good security. And it supports a wide range of Chrome security-focused add-ons.

Brave privacy is a little less clear. In 2019, Brave started displaying “privacy-respecting” ads in place of the original ads that the browser blocks. Part of the revenue from those ads can be paid out to the websites you visit the most, assuming that the website owner participates in the program.

This system makes us a little uncomfortable, since you have to trust that the ads displayed by Brave really do respect your privacy. You also have to trust that the information Brave gathers about your online activities to manage the program won’t be used in ways you don’t like. Fortunately, you can opt out of the whole program, thereby reducing the potential privacy problems.

Another way to boost your privacy when using Brave is to select the Private Window with Tor option. This puts you into a separate browser window where everyting you do in that window is automatically erased once you close the window. Adding to the privacy of this option is access to the internet through the Tor anonymity network, for additional protection.

Does the Brave browser work? Is it well supported?

In general, Brave works well. Like other browsers in this list, it can have problems when visiting websites that use scripts or display ads that Brave automatically blocks. There are full development and support teams in place, working to make sure that Brave bugs get fixed and the browser keeps up with changes to internet protocols and other issues.

Can you use Brave on all your devices?

The Brave browser runs on the top mobile and desktop platforms. Specifically, Brave is available for Windows, mac OS, Linux, iOS, and Android.

https://brave.com

4. Ungoogled Chromium browser

You may have noticed that many secure web browsers are built from the open source Chromium browser. Chromium is a fast, powerful, very secure browser, that forms the basis for Google Chrome. It is under constant development by Google, yet available for anyone to use in their own projects, because it is open source.

The big concern for Chromium is that there is a lot of code in Chromium that communicates with Google, a company that is not known for respecting the privacy of their users. ungoogled-chromium (yes, all lower-case characters is correct) is designed to give you all the benefits of Chromium (which is very similar to Chrome) without any of the ties to Google web services. The developers also included several options you can manually activate to increase the privacy of the browser among other things.

Is ungoogled-chromium secure? Is it private?

Chromium is considered to be very secure, and so is ungoogled-chromium. It benefits greatly from Google’s constant work on the security of the base Chromium browser, since ungoogled-chromium receives regular Chromium security updates.

The main goal of ungoogled-chromium is to take advantage of all the security and other benefits that Chromium offers, while eliminating the privacy issues caused by reliance on Google services and still giving you access to the add-ons in the Google Chrome store. Eliminating all those connections makes ungoogled-chromium both secure and private.

Does ungoogled-chromium work? Is it well supported?

ungoogled-chromium works well. However, it is important to realize that you could have some problems if you do want to interact with specific Google services that need code that’s been removed from this browser.

There’s a team of 50+ volunteer(?) contributors to the ungoogled-chromium project. We haven’t seen any complaints about the support the project receives, but have to assume that support will be better from a project like Firefox or Brave, where the projects have sources of income to pay the team.

If you want to try ungoogled-chromium, your best bet will be to build it from the source files yourself. There are binaries available but the disclaimer included makes us leery to use these binaries where privacy or security are important:

IMPORTANT: These binaries are provided by anyone who are willing to build and submit them. Diesel engine manuals free. Because these binaries are not necessarily reproducible, authenticity cannot be guaranteed. For your consideration, each download page lists the GitHub user that submitted those binaries.

Can you use ungoogled-chromium on all your devices?

Another drawback for ungoogled-chromium is that they do not provide Android or iOS support. They do, however, support Windows, mac OS, and Linux.

https://github.com/Eloston/ungoogled-chromium

5. Iridium browser

Here again we have a secure browser based on the open source Chromium browser.

Is Iridium secure and private?

Iridium includes modifications to force strict security and more privacy than the basic Chromium browser (or Google Chrome for that matter), while still giving you access to Chrome extensions. According to the Iridium website,

All modifications enhance the privacy of the user and make sure that the latest and best secure technologies are used. Automatic transmission of partial queries, keywords and metrics to central services is prevented and only occurs with the approval of the user.

Does Iridium work? Is it well supported?

Iridium does indeed work. However, not all Chrome add-ins work with Iridium due to the browser’s privacy and security settings or because they cannot verify Iridium.

Iridium is supported by the team at NETitwork GmbH. They issue regular updates as well as new versions of the browser to ensure that it is alway compatible with the latest internet protocols.

Can you use Iridium on all your devices?

Unfortunately, you cannot use Iridium on all your devices. While it supports Windows, mac OS, and several varieties of Linux, it does not support Android, iOS, or any other mobile operating system.

The company had plans to release mobile versions of the browser in the second half of 2020, but those were undoubtedly delayed or abandoned (like so much else) thanks to COVID lockdowns and illnesses.

https://iridiumbrowser.de

Secure browsers that don’t make the grade

There are several browsers out there that offer good security, but didn’t make our list. Here’s a quick rundown on some of them, and why we don’t consider it a good choice.

• Opera – The Opera browser once had a good reputation for security and privacy. Unfortunately, once it was sold to a Chinese consortium in 2016, things started going downhill. The company now gathers lots of data that they use for marketing and advertising campaigns, and can store it for up to three years. Whether or not Opera still offers good security, we don’t think it offers good privacy.
• Google Chrome – The most popular web browser in the world is indeed secure. Most secure browsers use Chromium (the open source base upon which Chrome is built) due to its excellent security and frequent updates. The problem, as we mentioned earlier, is on the privacy side of the equation. While Chrome will protect your privacy from outsiders, it is a pretty safe bet that anything you do with Chrome ends up in a Google database somewhere.
• Microsoft Internet Explorer / Edge – Microsoft is transitioning their user base from the old Internet Explorer to their new Edge browser. Internet Explorer isn’t very secure. Presumably Edge is much better, but whichever flavor of Microsoft browser you use, the problem is that it is a Microsoft browser. Like Google, Microsoft is known to do everything they can to gather personal information about the users of their products. Avoid these, please.
• Waterfox – This is a modified version of Firefox. That’s a good base upon which to build a secure and private browser. Unfortunately, in February 2020, Waterfox was purchased by System1, a PPC (Pay Per Click) advertising agency. This puts Waterfox in the same kind of situation as Chrome or Edge, belonging to a company that tries to collect as much information on its users as possible. Why risk your privacy in a situation like this when there are many options out there without this kind of problem.

Why you might want to use more than one browser at a time

After going to all the effort to choose the secure and private browser that’s best for your situation, you might wonder why in the world you would use anything else. But think for a minute about how you actually use a web browser.

Do you tend to leave the browser open on your desktop with 2, 5, 10, or more tabs open at the same time? Do you stay logged into more than one site at a time.

If so, you could be introducing security risks where the site you’re logged into on this tab can track what you are doing in that tab. While oour recommended browsers should be able to protect you, logging into your bank account while you have Facebook or some dark web movie site open at the same time is just inviting trouble.

The solution? Install multiple browsers from our recommendations, and use different browsers for different tasks. Maybe you only use ungoogled-chromium to log into your bank accounts, and Firefox for everything else. Now these are just examples, not specific recommendations. But you get the idea.

Using different browsers for different tasks can be a pain in the neck, but if your goal is the maximum possible security, it could be a good way to go.

You can take this idea one step further. For the maximum in security and privacy, you can run a browser in a Linux virtual machine using a program like VirtualBox. The browser running in the virtual machine would be totally isolated from the rest of your computer, with anything outside the virtual machine invisible to, and protected from, whatever happens in the virtual machine.

A VPN will increase your privacy and security when browsing online

One of the most confusing things about web browsers these days are their private or incognito modes. From their names, you might think that these modes would keep others from seeing your IP address. Your IP address can be used to identify your device on the internet and determine your location so it makes sense that a private mode would keep that, well, private.

Unfortunately, private and incognito modes don’t do that. They still share your IP address with every website you visit. All they do is delete data about your “private” session from your browser when you close the window. As Firefox explains:

Firefox clears your search and browsing history when you quit the app or close all Private Browsing tabs and windows. While this doesn’t make you anonymous to websites or your internet service provider, it makes it easier to keep what you do online private from anyone else who uses this computer.

If you want to keep your wife from knowing that you are checking out your ex’s Facebook page, a private session could be just what you need. Wrngs splendido incubowrenegade stables. But if you want to prevent your ISP and anyone else who cares to spy on your connection from identifying you using your IP address, private / incognito modes are useless.

For real online privacy (and excellent security), you need to use a VPN in conjunction with your web browser. The VPN will prevent anyone else from seeing your real IP address, while adding another layer of security on top of that provided by your web browser.

Here at SecurityTech we’ve tested more VPNs than we care to count, and picked out the ones that provide excellent security, along with other important VPN characteristics like privacy and speed. You can count on us to keep testing, retesting and updating our recommendations, but as of November 2020, here are out top two recommended VPNs:

• NordVPN – Secure, private, and faster than any VPN we’ve ever seen, it is hard to go wrong with these guys.
• Surfshark – Coming out of nowhere to the #2 spot in our list in just a couple of years, Surfshark is a worthy challenger.

Conclusion on secure and private browsers

It is unfortunate that the most popular web browser in the world (Google Chrome) is secure but doesn’t protect your privacy. If you value both security and privacy, you need to look elsewhere.

In this article, we showed you our picks for the best secure browsers that also protect your privacy properly. While they are similar in many ways, each has unique characteristics that could make one of them more suitable for you than the other.

Here’s what we recommend you do:

1. Read through this article, and select the secure web browser that looks most interesting to you.
2. Download it and give it a thorough trial. All the browsers in the list are free, so all it will cost you is a little bit of time to install and a little bit of attention to how comfortable you are using it. Be sure to try it for long enough to use it in all your normal web browsing activities.
3. If all is good, you may have found your new web browser. If you aren’t sure, or are simply curious, download another from the list and put it to work.
4. Rinse and repeat until you settle on the one (or two, or three) browsers you will use from now on.

Good luck and have fun!

How to choose a browser for everyday use?

Introduction

Let's start with the basics. What is the point of a web browser? Originally, it was to be able to read HTML documents, but since then, the Web has changed massively, and modern browsers need to satisfy more demands. The basic terminal browser - links, w3m, Lynx, elinks - can still be used today to display websites only in text. Actually, elinks supports features that are somehow missing in 'modern' web browsers (such as editing cookies, custom stylesheets or keybinding), but in the end, they can all be got back through addons. Maximum of 256 colors, no images, little or no Javascript support, limited CSS support, no loading of non-HTML content such as videos (but can load externally), and no addons make these unsuitable for modern day browsing.

I could mention many other browsers here. Surf is a graphical web browser that has image and Javascript support, but no tabs or an actual user interface. Midori has everything you'd expect from a modern web browser and even includes in-built functionality to replace some of the common addons, but it's not enough. Otter Browser is a promising project with a very nice UI, but has no addon support (so far, though it's planned). Qutebrowser is a keyboard controlled browser that recently added per-domain settings, but they are inferior to uMatrix. Many of its features can be replaced by, again, addons.

One advantage of these niche browsers is that they don't spy on you, but what I've learned from trying probably all of them is that, in the end, addons are essential - especially uMatrix is irreplaceable. So, for a day-to-day browser, you have only two options: Firefox based and Chrome based. Since they all support the same addons (with slight exception in Pale Moon), we will have to use some other criteria to judge these browsers. These consist of usability, privacy, customizability, philosophy, respect for the user, looks, and speed. Let's analyze them one by one:

Firefox based browsers

Mozilla Firefox

There is a long history of anti-user decisions with this one - it's so big I've written a massive article about it and other Mozilla's sins. Briefly, they include removing configuration options, having anti-privacy default search engines, lying about being privacy-based, removing addon compatibility, disrespecting contributors, shoving you targeted advertisements, enforcing usage of certain other software, and many, many others (read the article!). Add to that the slow speed and shitty UI and you have a browser you're never going to want to use. August 2020 update: Mozilla has now clearly ceased caring about technology, but is instead fully focusing on social issues - From combatting a lethal virus and battling systemic racism. As if it wasn't already obvious earlier, they have now thrown out 250 people mostly working on technical stuff such as their rendering engine or browser security. I suspect this is preparation for ceding control of the web browsing ecosystem to Google soon (as predicted in Mozilla - Devil Incarnate, they were always controlled opposition). I doubt any Firefox based browsers will survive this apocalypse, to be honest.

GNU IceCat

Firefox fork from the Free Software Foundation - with a huge focus on freetardism. This means no Flash Player compatibility as well as an annoying LibreJS addon included by default. Older versions had some spyware in there, but 60.2 removed all of it as far as I can see. Some privacy addons are included by default, but you should still use uMatrix - though newbies might like having some privacy built-in. Though it is made by more ethical people, this browser still suffers from many of Firefox' ills - like the shitty UI, slow speed, lack of configuration, deprecated addons etc. All in all, IceCat fixes many Firefox issues but leaves more of them in - and it can't be otherwise since they are fully dependent on Mozilla's decisions in the end. UPDATE: it's fucking August 2020, and the latest release of IceCat is still version 60.7 compared to Firefox 79. Packages for most distros are also not provided, so you'll have to compile. I recommend skipping this one especially in light of the recent happenings at Mozilla.

LibreWolf

LibreWolf is to Firefox what Ungoogled-Chromium is to Chrome. The first version (Librefox) was considered just an 'enhanced' Firefox - until it was killed by Mozilla(archive). Some community members revived it as an independent project this time. LibreWolf aims to fix many of the issues vanilla FF has - it will be compiled with no telemetry, Pocket or pulseaudio requirements. All included search engines will be private by default (no big G) and no unsolicited requests will be made. At least, that was the plan but then it died and was inactive for a very long time apparently until now (March 12) - so watch this space for updates! UPDATE April 3: the new appimage release has no problems aside from the lists for uBlock Origin being automatically updated. Clearly nothing compared to what Firefox is doing, but LibreWolf is still dependent on Mozilla - if they start adding more nonsense, removing about:config options, userchrome.css support (as they were planning to do), Alsa support, etc. then LibreWolf devs will have to maintain those features themselves, and I doubt they can keep up with such a small dev power. But for now, it is a fine alternative to vanilla Firefox if you really want to base on it. UPDATE August 2020: the dev team admits they have a problem(archive) with Mozilla firing their employees and has doubts about the future of the project.

Waterfox

Another browser pretending to care about your privacy(archive) - We’re obsessed with protecting your privacy. That’s why we’ve made Waterfox Private Browsing more powerful than the others., when in fact Waterfox does nothing whatsoever to protect it and actually spies on you almost as much as Firefox(archive) (it made 109 unsolicited requests upon my run of it). The more powerful private browsing mode is a sham as well - anyone caring about their privacy will not rely on this but install essential privacy addons, so his deceptive claims are designed to lure in newbies only. This browser is completely dependent on Firefox, has its shitty UI and all the other flaws and does not even bother to remove much of the spyware. It's also run by a single developer (who is also a liar and hates privacy as proven above) so you don't know how long it will keep going. There are some positives, however - Waterfox is the only browser out there to support both XUL and WebExtensions, as well as NPAPI plugins. Still, due to all the other issues, this browser should be ignored. UPDATE FEBRUARY 2020: yet another reason to avoid Waterfox - it's been sold to an advertising company(archive), the same one that claimed StartPage.

Summary

Firefox is absolutely terrible and its forks have not much to be proud of either, as we can see. Though some of them do remove (some or all of) the spyware problems, they either add their own or have some other issues, like IceCat's incompatibility with Flash Player and lack of updates, or Waterfox' shady ownership. LibreWolf, the only project with actual potential, has been abandoned resurrected, but still only a few people are involved. The other, more important reason to avoid Firefox-based browsers is that they are all still dependent on the evil Mozilla. If they ever officially cede control to Google (as is already happening in all but name[archive]) - the whole Internet will be pretty much taken over by an even more evil corpo. I have predicted this in the report above, but it was somewhat speculative at the time. Now, it's pretty much a certainty it will happen in a few years. UPDATE August 2020: Mozilla is self-destructing (see above) so a Google owned web might soon become a reality. Knowing this, it is obvious Chrome forks can't be any better, but let us check them out anyway:

Chrome based browsers

Google Chrome

A massive platform dedicated entirely to data collection(archive)..but at least it doesn't pretend to be something else, unlike Firefox. Shitty 'modern' UI (like Firefox), lack of customizability (no in-built proxy settings, even?), little in-built features, slow, dependent on the evil Google company..Avoid like the plague.

Iridium Browser

Billing itself as A BROWSER SECURING YOUR PRIVACY. THAT’S IT, it actually fulfills the claim aside from a few spyware issues still left in. Specifically, your private Iridium Browser will make a connection to Big G every 30 minutes to download their Safe Browsing database - what a joke. The devs have reacted dismissingly(archive) to the issue, plus have sneakily added more recent spyware(archive) - so I don't think they're to be trusted. Iridium has a hasn't been updated in a long time (it's August 2020, but the last release is from April based on Chromium 81 - compared to Ungoogled-Chromium's 84). There's no AppImage or portable build, making installation a bigger problem. This was my browser of choice for a long time (until I found the one below), but it doesn't do anything aside from disabling automatic connections - and not even all of them, at that. If you want a private Chrome based browser, this one is a much better choice:

Ungoogled-chromium

Unlike Iridium, Ungoogled-Chromium actually disables all automatic connections and other Google integration. The dev is also a really nice and skilled guy (at least he doesn't have a problem with people reporting stuff - unlike Pale Moon, or worse - Mozilla). However, keep in mind the Chromium codebase is massive, and it's doubtful this single guy can keep up for long (then again, he does lift patches from other similar projects such as Bromite, and has a helpful userbase). He's doing better than the Iridium team, though - with his browser being much more up to date. In the end, Ungoogled-Chromium is still just a bunch of bandages applied to Chromium, and keeps Uncle G in control of the Web. There's not any real features added beyond the privacy fixes and a few CLI options(archive). Still, it is surely the best Chromium fork out there if a Google monopoly doesn't bother you. The packages are available only for a few distros (plus Windows and Mac), but fortunately, there's an AppImage as well as a portable build that work everywhere.

Brave Browser

This browser has made waves thanks to its built-in privacy protections - such as AdBlock, HTTPS everywhere and script blocking - but in the end, they are outclassed by uMatrix. More than that - after checking them out, I can confidently say the Shields are pretty useless - the vast majority of trackers are left alone; in fact, sometimes it seems that a site can have hundreds of them, and yet none of them will be blocked by the Shields. Script blocking option simply blocks JavaScript fully - it's just NoScript revisited. Brave used to be able to install Chrome extensions only from source, but now does it the same as the other Chrome based browsers. Despite those, it not only spies on you(archive) but is actively working against your privacy by whitelisting Facebook and Twitter trackers. Brave has also been soliciting donations in the name of other people without their consent!
Here(archive) is a thread discussing the issue. UPDATE August 2020: since I wrote this, more shady shit from these guys has surfaced. For example, not only do they have sponsored backgrounds (recall Mozilla's Directory Tiles?) in their New Tab page but they were also earning big money from the included affiliate links without telling you (this is illegal and they've locked the convo as expected)! More recently, they were caught rewriting typed web addresses to add referrals for various partners. Brave Browser also has auto-updates(archive) that cannot be disabled which is extremely malicious (complete with a closed topic, of course - in a Mozilla-esque fashion). The only real reason to use Brave is their so-called Brave Rewards program with which you can earn their Basic Attention Tokens in exchange for watching ads (displayed as system notifications). Here's the catch: to pay out their BATshit tokens, you need an account on Uphold, whose Privacy Policy states this:

To verify your identity, we collect your name, address, phone, email, and other similar information. We may also require you to provide additional Personal Data for verification purposes, including your date of birth, taxpayer or government identification number, or a copy of your government-issued identification

Facebook tier surveillance. But wait, it's not over:

We may obtain information from affiliated and non-affiliated third parties, such as credit bureaus, identity verification services, and other screening services to verify that you are eligible to use our Services, and will associate that information with the information we collected from you.

They will also stalk you all over the Internet to try to find already existing information. There's still more violations coming, so sit back and watch:

Uphold uses Veriff to verify your identity by determining whether a selfie you take matches the photo in your government-issued identification. Veriff’s facial recognition technology collects information from your photos that may include biometric data, and when you provide your selfie, you will be asked to agree that Veriff may process biometric data and other data (including special categories of data) from the photos you submit and share it with Uphold. Automated processes may be used to make a verification decision.

As soon as I think I've found the biggest privacy violator possible, the cold hammer of reality strikes that stupid idea right out of my skull. Anyway - again - the only way to pay out BATshit tokens is by using this service. Even then, you can only do it once a month and Brave still swipes 30%(archive) of it - You’ll earn 70% of the ad revenue that we receive from advertisers. This is portrayed as a way of revolutionizing the Internet ad industry - the middlemen and platform operators capture most of today’s ad revenue, while creating malware distribution and ad fraud opportunities. Brave Rewards upends this broken system and provides a new way forward for creator support. However, the real revolution will happen when the whole ad business model is dead and buried, or even better - when content creators don't need to worry about 'earning a living' because the capitalist monster has been slain or at least put on a leash. For now, you can just support the sites you like directly with Bitcoin, anonymously and on your own terms. All you need is a wallet and a person you want to donate to (I have an address at the top of the page ^_^). Anyway, at the beginning I was way too forgiving for Slave (certainly nothing Brave about it) Browser - let it rot along with all the scams they're pulling.

Dissenter Browser

This Brave fork was whipped out in literally a few days in response to the recent wave of censorship from Twitter, Facebook, Mozilla etc. Its claim to fame is being integrated with the Dissenter extension (banned from Firefox's and Chrome's extension stores(archive)) which allows you to comment on any article from any website, bypassing their censorship policies. Quite handy. To use it, however, you need to sign up for their social network, which requires ReCaptcha (devs have dismissed the issue(archive)). Then, to post a comment, you of course have to share the site you're on with Dissenter, which, if used extensively, could build quite a profile of your browsing history. Who's to say they won't run away with all that data then? Their privacy policy(archive), consisting of one fucking sentence says literally nothing about what they collect and share, so you might assume it's everything with whoever. As for the browser, it contains the usual Brave shit like Shields, whitelisted trackers and safebrowsing. In addition to those - whenever you open a new tab, Dissenter will connect to a bunch of news sites and youtube, as well as clearbit to download their icons; fortunately, this can be disabled. Their site is also cloudflared, which means all your history and comments will be shared with the evil tech giant(archive), MITMing from the shadows. All in all, this browser is just a fad riding on the current anti-censorship climate. In fact, I'd say it's very likely a honeypot designed to collect the browsing and comment history from as many people as possible and share them with the great centralizer (Cloudflare), to help eventually create an Internet that is fully controlled by the elites. The idea is nice (and I hope someone worthy repeats it) but the execution could not have been worse. Run the fuck away faster than you would from an angry, rabid dog! Speaking of dogs, the Spyware Watchdog has an in-depth review of some other issues with Dissenter.

Opera

Used to use a custom engine and was highly praised by the users, but after switching to Blink (Chrome engine) it dropped most of its features and left waves of dissatisfied users. A few years later it was bought by a Chinese company which put the final nail in its coffin. Forget about its bullshit marketing talk such as Now with a built-in ad blocker, battery saver and free VPN. Opera heavily spies on you(archive), including on your whole browsing history. Integrated by default with spyware platforms such as Facebook, WhatsApp (owned by FB), and Telegram (apparently insecure according to the cryptographers). The VPN is very likely a Chinese honeypot and uMatrix outclasses all adblockers. Though it has some nice features like mouse gestures and automatic currency conversion, there's not much reason to use nuOpera over the other Chrome forks. Avoid.

Vivaldi

UPDATE: it's August 2020, and nothing has changed for Vivaldi. It's still the most featureful browser out of the box (mouse gestures, screenshots, web panels, notes..) and boasts massive amounts of customizability (in regards to tabs, bookmarks, keyboard shortcuts that no other browser can change by default). However, it also still includes a bunch of spyware such as Google SafeBrowsing and auto-updates. But their most egregious way of privacy violation is this:

When you install Vivaldi browser (“Vivaldi”), each installation profile is assigned a unique user ID that is stored on your computer. Vivaldi will send a message using HTTPS directly to our servers located in Iceland every 24 hours containing this ID, version, cpu architecture, screen resolution and time since last message.

The above cannot be disabled even if you're a programming ninja - because Vivaldi's source code is unavailable! Their New Tab page is filled with various partners' websites by default, including violators such as YouTube and Amazon - though you can fortunately remove those. The default search engine is the anti-privacy Bing. Tracking protection is included but it's off by default. It doesn't seem as if Vivaldi cares about privacy too much - it's also closed source. The only saving grace is the massive amount of features, which is of course significant - but most of those can be replaced with extensions on browsers that support them. There also comes a point where a piece of software is trying to do too much - and Vivaldi might have crossed that bridge already. But at least it's something different compared to all the browsers that are bare-bones.

Summary

The situation with Chrome forks is better than Firefox ones - there's more of them and they are more commonly updated. We've got more variety in terms of features, included addons, looks, philosophies, etc. But something seems to be missing. The ones with more features introduce their own problems such as custom spyware, false advertising, lack of ethics, even less speed, or crashes. The ones removing all the spyware don't introduce anything new. And they all still rely on the Blink engine (and thus Google). And since Google keeps including anti-user changes(archive), the forks will have to remove / modify those in the code, which some of the smaller teams might not be able to eventually keep up with. Is that it? Are we really stuck with desperately trying to patch up the big corpo abominations?

The Fallen Hero - Pale Moon

It used to be fucking good - and still has several advantages over FF / Chrome such as independent development, lack of some antifeatures, less vulnerabilities, XUL addons support, better UI, smaller codebase, and more customizability. However it recently went off the deep end so much that I cannot in good conscience call it an 'alternative' to anything anymore. Let me give some examples:

• Blocking the AdNauseam extension(archive) due to allegedly causing economic damage to websites. But actually, it's the ads and trackers that are causing human damage(archive) and if extensions such as AdNauseam help kill the 'economy' based on them, they should be praised instead of banned. Re-enabling AdNauseam requires fiddling with about:config.
• NoScript was another extension added to the blocklist with the 'rationale' that it breaks sites (that's how it achieves its security and other benefits - same as uMatrix or adblockers). There is a big scary warning(archive) but fortunately, you could still use the extension.
• Pale Moon's website (including the addon search integrated into the browser) is behind the evil Cloudflare MitM. The CF-loving lead dev thinks it's fine(archive) for people to be violated by CF without being notified (or worse, a way to resist) and goes around sharing that message.
• He also hates the TOR network(archive) because the people using it dare to protect their identities or stand up to their oppressive governments.
• A contributor created a backup of Mozilla's XUL docs (that they want to delete in December 2020) and got dubbed an insect(archive) for it by Tobin, the other main developer.
• He is also insulting long time contributors even in commit messages for petty reasons(archive).
• They both have hounded the OpenBSD packagers(archive) because they wanted to use system libs which would be deviating from official configuration - something the PM devs hate. They also hardcode compiler parameters, especially with libvpx to use specific opcodes instead of using whatever the user or operating system sets ${CFLAGS}/${CXXFLAGS} to, breaking portability with different CPUs and operating systems.
• Pale Moon now has WebAssembly enabled by default(archive), the whole point of which(archive) is pushing cancer such as AAA games that have heavy assets, VR and augmented reality and Live video augmentation onto web browsers. Talk about scope creep! It pretty much turns your web browser into another operating system since it's literally assembly to which you can compile other languages and run all kinds of 'apps'. Of course, you can imagine all the new security vulnerabilities coming along with that. And just a year ago it was a not recommended technology(archive)..
• And the icing on the cake - they've now started forbidding direct addon downloads(archive) - much to the dismay of many(archive)users(archive). Tobin has called wanting to actually have control over your extensions obsessive packrat tendancies. and Moonchild followed with hoarding addiction. Now contrast that attitude with the quotes on their main page - Your browser, Your way or offering full customization. Doesn't this sound familiar?
• UPDATE Nov 2020: the straw that finally broke the camel's back - the removal of global custom user agent. Whereas the other malicious changes can be kind of justified with some twisted reasoning, this one is absolutely impossible without going directly against Pale Moon's stated goals, such as customization (the main page mentions it three times). See, Moonchild thinks(archive) that the global override is a terrible Web Compat footgun that the users shouldn't have access to. Of course, it's somehow fine to allow UA setting per site or request, despite it being terribly inefficient. Even then, a global custom UA actually helps web compatibility by sneaking past those UA-sniffing sites (which will not stop existing anytime soon). All of this is besides the point though - what matters is that the users should be able to shoot themselves in the foot if they so desire, and this recent change goes against that. For honesty's sake, let me say that Moonchild reverted the change - but only because of the huge backlash(archive) on the forums. The fact that this was an idea in his mind for even one second proves he doesn't give two shits about freedom, customizability, or user respect.

And with that, it's obvious that Pale Moon is a sinking ship. A few months ago I've said that the browser is in the beginning stages of degradation. Now, the stage is clearly advanced, the cancer has metastasized and cannot be removed anymore. Pale Moon has become exactly what they've fought against for so long - Mozilla-lite. It's still a good enough piece of software (and the only decent one for browsing the modern web) - but one I cannot recommend anymore due to violating the most important principles (which for years have defined it). So what do we do now that the giant has commited suicide?

Web Browser

If you're worried about Pale Moon's issues, know that one of our community chatroom members is developing a fork called Web Browser that is focused on stability, privacy and customizability even more so than its predecessor. Pale Moon still has auto-updates, OCSP and a few other unsolicited requests by default - as well as an extension blocklist. Web Browser either lacks PM's issues (no automatic connections or an extension blocklist) or is in the process of fixing them (using system libraries instead of bundling your own, disabling WebAssembly by default). There's a NixOS package and a SlackBuild(archive) with support for other operating system coming soon (or you can compile from source). The guy is looking for additional developers, so go check the project out if you want to help.

What's wrong with auto-updates?

There is everything wrong with autoupdate, basically you are giving whoever controls the updates full control over your software and data, with autoupdates it is possible to:

• Insert backdoors, spyware and malware.
• Add unnecessary features.
• Remove features.
• Target a single user with shit like A/B testing, treating people like guinea pigs.
• Make unwanted changes, like the dreaded UI changes.
• Locking down content behind paywalls
• Whatever else malicious developers want to do with you.

Autoupdate has always been used for bad, its purpose was always to take control away from the user, updating should ALWAYS be a choice.

Source: Nanon - hope he doesn't mind me reposting this. And let me add modifying user settings to the list of auto-update issues - something which Firefox has done many times, for example.

Summary

Pale Moon is still the only decent way to browse the modern web that's actually relevant - but it's slowly rotting from the inside. Firefox is dying and will soon bring down all its forks alongside itself, surrendering the Web to Google whose abomination of a browser is just as worthless. Promising projects such as Otter Browser or suckless surf suffer from small dev teams, no / low addon support and don't have their own engines - so depend on Google / Apple, anyway. The only reasonable choice is Pale Moon until Web Browser gets more support. Or, just try wean yourself off the modern web by sticking to websites such as the ones on Neocities, wiby.me, etc. which are functional in NetSurf or terminal browsers. I hate to kill the positivity of yet another summary, but if reality forces me to - what can I do?

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