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New Chrome Beta Adds Privacy Controls, Translation Option
billandad writes "Anyone would think the timing was deliberate; just as Microsoft is forced into giving users the option to switch from IE via the browser ballot screen, so Google introduces a new Chrome beta with enhanced privacy features to chisel away at Microsoft's market share. '... you can control how browser cookies, images, JavaScript, plug-ins, and pop-ups are handled on a site-by-site basis. For example, you can set up cookie rules to allow cookies specifically only for sites that you trust, and block cookies from untrusted sites.' The new beta also adds language detection, and will prompt the user to translate a page if it's written in a foreign tongue."
And Opera 10.50 has just been released too, the first version of Opera with <Video> tag support.
With Chrome, Safari and Firefox all evolving quickly, the future of the web is looking good. I just wish they would all support an open, royalty-free codec.
Struggling to find a day everyone can make? WhenShallWe.com
I am glad to see Chrome coming along so well, it's nice having 5 legitimate choices to use (IE, Firefox, Opera, Chrome, Safari). The competition is driving improvements, and it's the users that are benefiting. There are still some WebApps that I have to use IE or Firefox for, but now that Chrome has extensions (delicious bookmarks, IEtab, etc.) it has been my browser of choice.
You don't have to "trust" their browser at all.
The source code for Chrome is freely available. If you find any features that are unfriendly towards privacy, you're free to modify the source.
Okay - chromium can be made safe, but not Chrome. Chrome + Vbox machine + Wireshark = Proof of concept. Chrome talks to google servers no matter what settings you put them on. Good luck with privacy.
I'm a bit the same. On technical grounds, I'd like to use Chrome instead of the increasingly bloated Firefox, and given sufficient privacy and security safeguards I could live without the other plug-ins I use.
But Chrome comes from Google, and releases often with an auto-updating mechanism. Given both Google's form for being wildly off-target on privacy issues (Buzz, etc.) and the openly dismissive/arrogant attitude exhibited by some of their senior executives, I just don't trust them not to pull a fast one and start logging every page I visit, or sneaking in ads at the browser level, or something along those lines.
Perhaps this could theoretically be avoided by careful checking of the small print before each update, or adjusting certain settings so things don't happen automatically, but I don't want to have to do that sort of thing just to be able to update my web browser safely and make sure no-one's sneaked anything in. I'll just use another browser instead.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
That's the usual trick. The privacy settings conveniently ignore any such issue and only concentrate on the client side things like "private tab" or cookie handling. Of course, if you don't want to go completely white-list based (and most users don't), there's no way to explicitly block certain domains like google-analytics.com.
Of course it's convenient for Google to call only that privacy and completely ignore the fact that every Chrome installation has identifier about where you downloaded it, when you installed it, an unique identifier, everything you type to browser bar is sent to Google, any domain you visit is sent to Google, and so on...
You don't have to "trust" their browser at all. The source code for Chrome is freely available. If you find any features that are unfriendly towards privacy, you're free to modify the source.
If - and only if - you can read and understand the source.
If - and only if - you have the programming skills - and the time - to produce a well-behaved modification.
I am tempted to argue that when a program reaches a certain size or complexity the difference between closed and open source becomes academic.
Look at SRWare Iron - Chrome without the Google tie-in
Edit: There is an HORRIFIC flash slide-in advertisement in their site. Easy to close, innocuous content, but it appears on Every. Single. Page. I just decided not to update my version of Iron.
Finally had enough. Come see us over at https://soylentnews.org/
It seems no browser offers the functionality to wipe those out, and yet they can contain malicious code (there was a recent infection at the office).
You might be interested in the BetterPrivacy plugin for Firefox.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
Within Chrome. Of course you can use some 3rd party apps, but that's not an excuse not to have it.
Also just FYI, Ad blockers on Chrome don't stop the http requests being made, they just hide ads. It's useless for blocking data gathering services because your info is still being sent.
Good choice. Iron is a very questionable project, and the developer has admitted that he's just spreading FUD about Google to drive traffic to his site to make money off ads.
Also, http://neugierig.org/software/chromium/notes/2009/12/iron.html
Iron was created by a person who's admitted that he's spreading FUD about Google just to drive traffic to his site so he can make money off his ads. Is that the kind of project you want to cheer for?