Browzar: The Anonymous Browser eliminating Footprints

Browzar is a free and portable web browser designed for Windows to provide enhanced privacy by not caching files, storing history, saving cookies, or using auto-complete. It was marketed as a "disposable" browser suitable for public computers or internet cafes.

Browzar was widely reported as a web browser that takes privacy and security serious. It seems most authors who "tested" Browzar did not do their homeworks and parroted instead what the developers of Browzar were claiming. The first thing that strikes me as odd is that Browzar is not really a new web browser, but simply an add on of the Internet Explorer by Microsoft. It uses the same engine and identifies itself as Internet Explorer.

The homepage of Browzar will be the starting page of it from now on, with no way of changing that setting. Not a really good feature, don't you think? The search feature uses Overture, a well known pay per click search engine, to generate revenue for the developers it seems. What about privacy? Do they live up to that promise or is this also not what they want us to believe it is?

Do we have more privacy when surfing with Browzar? The answer is a simple no, we do not. Browzar supports Active X, supports cookies, sends all the information every web browser sends (like os, version etc). Someone from Slashdot tested it with Gmail from Google and found out that he was still logged into his gmail account after closing and reopening Browzar. Not really private is it?

Update: The latest version of Browzar is 2.0, it is available on the project website, and still advertised as a browser that is not saving data. While it may be that the developers have improved the browser in this regard, I'd suggest to anyone wanting to try the browser to run it in a test environment first to make sure the claims can now be verified with tests. On the positive side of things, the browser is portable and starts up really fast.

Update 2: The web browser has not received an update after version 2.0 was released in December 2008. It appears that the browser is in fact abandoned and no longer maintained. I suggest you use private browsing modes which all modern browsers support for activities on the Internet that you want to keep private.