Firefox 117 Available With Local Automated Translation Support

[schmidtbag]

You can do a hell of a lot not only without being logged into anything, but without having a Google, Amazon, or Facebook account at all.

If you create no accounts of any kind, pretty much all you can do is consume some free content and do research. That's not insignificant; for some people, that could be most of the time they spend on the internet. But, everything else you do needs an account or will tie back to you in some other way. Even if you're not signing in with a Google account, there are a lot of sites out there that still have some connection with Google.

If you do have those, you should clear all history before logging into one, do what you need to do while doing nothing else, log out, and clear all history again before doing anything else. Also, Firefox offers containers that can be used to isolate sites like Google and especially Facebook. Note that if you isolate these you cannot of course use them to log into anything else, but that is a bad practice anyway due both to tracking and the consequences of a hijacked account.

*facepalm* Clearing your browser history is local. It does absolutely nothing to stop any over-the-internet data that has been tracked from your user activity. The discussion at hand is about security and access to personal information; the only people who are affected by clearing your browser data are those who have direct access to your computer. If you're that paranoid about friends and family spying on your browser history, you may want to consider getting a less shameful hobby.

[Luke]

If you create no accounts of any kind, pretty much all you can do is consume some free content and do research. That's not insignificant; for some people, that could be most of the time they spend on the internet. But, everything else you do needs an account or will tie back to you in some other way. Even if you're not signing in with a Google account, there are a lot of sites out there that still have some connection with Google.

*facepalm* Clearing your browser history is local. It does absolutely nothing to stop any over-the-internet data that has been tracked from your user activity. The discussion at hand is about security and access to personal information; the only people who are affected by clearing your browser data are those who have direct access to your computer. If you're that paranoid about friends and family spying on your browser history, you may want to consider getting a less shameful hobby.

It is reasonable to assume that sites tracking a user via 3ed party widgets may attempt to read browsing history and certainly will read cookies, clearing history burns the low hanging tracking fruit off of the tree. If is of course necessary to use NoScript or Ublock Origin to deny all sites the ability to load 3ed party code especially the Facebook "Like" button, anything from Google, and anything from any ad network or otherwise unrecognized.

If you insist on using Gmail and don't want to upload your entire browsing history to Google (excluding those sites w no Google widgets at all), you must not be logged in while doing anything else! Even then, to prevent Google from associating your IP address with your account and de facto logging you back in for tracking purposes, you must both clear cookies (and other history to make evercookies harder) and not allow Google to load anything when not on Gmail or Youtube. I suggest exiling both of those to Torbrowser and putting up with having to restart multiple times to bypass Google blocks on selected Tor exit nodes.

Also note that Google has been fined before for tracking people with location turned off or otherwise opted out of some form of tracking. I would say the only fully reliable way to keep your name off whatever Google collects is not to have an account, not to use Google, and to block them on all other sites.

As for Chrome, even the Washington Post has called it spyware and advised their readers not to use it.

[Luke]

As for paid content, I do not use it at all-there is not a single purchased file in all of the file systems of all the devices I own unless you count low level firmware shipped with devices

[schmidtbag]

It is reasonable to assume that sites tracking a user via 3ed party widgets may attempt to read browsing history and certainly will read cookies, clearing history burns the low hanging tracking fruit off of the tree. If is of course necessary to use NoScript or Ublock Origin to deny all sites the ability to load 3ed party code especially the Facebook "Like" button, anything from Google, and anything from any ad network or otherwise unrecognized.

If you're using a 3rd party extension that reads your history and cookies, you deserve to have that tracked. The browser itself otherwise doesn't do that and has no compelling reason to. For most of these companies, they get 99% of what they need simply by whatever data you transmit to the internet.

If you insist on using Gmail and don't want to upload your entire browsing history to Google (excluding those sites w no Google widgets at all), you must not be logged in while doing anything else! Even then, to prevent Google from associating your IP address with your account and de facto logging you back in for tracking purposes, you must both clear cookies (and other history to make evercookies harder) and not allow Google to load anything when not on Gmail or Youtube. I suggest exiling both of those to Torbrowser and putting up with having to restart multiple times to bypass Google blocks on selected Tor exit nodes.

The only way Google would be tracking your browsing history is if you signed into Chrome (which BTW, does not require a Google account) and allowed your browsing history to be synced. Otherwise, they can get a large chunk of your browsing history without having to download anything from your PC, simply through ads and whatever accounts of yours that may be linked to them. I wouldn't be surprised if some sites still sell data to these companies, even if your account isn't linked or if adblock is enabled.
Remember: companies like Google, Amazon, and Facebook don't have to know who you are. They can still roughly figure things out based on your IP address. That's why you can get ads for specific products you definitely did not search for: it's because someone else on your network searched for such things.

Also, why don't you use use Incognito/Private browsing? It's a hell of a lot easier than going through all these other steps.

Also note that Google has been fined before for tracking people with location turned off or otherwise opted out of some form of tracking. I would say the only fully reliable way to keep your name off whatever Google collects is not to have an account, not to use Google, and to block them on all other sites.

No, the fully reliable way to not be tracked is to not use the internet. Just accept that if you want to enjoy it, there is a way for some institution to track you. The fact of the matter is, you (not specifically you) don't have a good reason to concern about this. One of my computers use Chrome, I have my account synced, I don't block all ads, and I use some (not all) of Google's services. I know they (among other institutions) are collecting my data, some of which without my permission - so long as I've done nothing wrong and they they don't interfere with my life, I genuinely don't care.

As for Chrome, even the Washington Post has called it spyware and advised their readers not to use it.

You say that as though this is some sort of revelation. But if we're to play devil's advocate for a moment: most of what Google collects is totally legal, there isn't evidence of that data collection being malicious, and most of the data they collect isn't from Chrome. There is absolutely legitimate spyware going on (like you said about tracking location without permission) but the bulk of the data collected is legal based on Google's TOS.

[Luke]

Whether Google's behavior is legal or not, no law requires you to connect to their servers or use their products. There terms of service are as incompatable with my terms of service as the GPL v3 is with the Microsoft Windows license. I reject being the product so I block Google, Meta, and all their 3ed party widgets. Naturally I strip Google out of my Firefox installs as well as rejecting Chrome.

There are plenty of sites that are not monetized/offer exclusively free content e.g Mastodon servers, where there is no incentive to track users as no ads are sold. This includes all of the sites I post my video news reports to. If Meta's "threads" ever federates with Mastodon networks I will block that entire domain from interacting with my account so as to keep Meta's mitts off my data. So will a lot of other Mastodon users, and the "Fedipact" is a growing server-level commitment to block Threads. Lots of refugees from Facebook do not want Facebook following them to Mastodon.

This is also doable with apps. Example: Google Maps is paid for with your privacy(you are the product not the customer), while OpenStreetMap and ~Osmand are not. If you use Google Maps, everywhere you go becomes an open book. If you disable Google Maps and Google Play services on phones and use ~Osmand, you are not tracked by your maps as ~Osmand uses predownloaded maps and can be used offline entirely. Another example: Youtube is paid for by selling your data, while archive.org doesn't even retain IP address logs for security reasons.