uBlock Origin is now the most popular Firefox add-on
For a long time, content blocker Adblock Plus held the popularity crown over at the Mozilla Firefox add-ons repository. It was trailed by uBlock Origin, another content blocker, which gained rapidly in terms of user numbers.
Now, uBlock Origin has surpassed Adblock Plus on the Firefox add-ons store, making it the number one Firefox extension in regards to user numbers.
Mozilla reports that uBlock Origin crossed the 5.5 million users mark while Adblock Plus is sitting at 5.47 million users at the time of writing. If the trend continues, the gap between the two ad blockers will widen in the coming months and years.
UBlock Origin beats Adblock Plus in other metrics as well. The average rating is 4.8 out of 5 on the Mozilla add-ons store, while Adblock Plus has a rating of 4.5 out of 5. As far as the number of reviews is concerned: uBlock Origin received more than 13200 reviews, thousands more than Adblock Plus' 8500 reviews at the time of writing.
The uBlock Origin extension was first published on Mozilla's extensions store in April 2015 by its creator Raymond Hill, known as gorhill online. The extension was created after Hill left the uBlock project that he created.
Hill improved the extension over the years, adding features and improvements to it on a regular basis. To name a few improvements: blocking WebRTC from leaking IP addresses, removing elements permanently from webpages, blocking JavaScript by default, and addressing new tracking methods, such as CNAME tracking,
The Firefox version of uBlock Origin is considered the version that offers the best protection, as it supports protection against CNAME tracking, which the Chrome versions do not offer.
Hill calls uBlock Origin a "wide-spectrum content blocker" instead of an ad blocker. The extension blocks more advertisement but also trackers, miners, popups, malicious URLs and more by default. Users may add more lists, for instance to deal with annoyances on the Internet.
Many users hold uBlock Origin in high regard because of its memory and CPU effectiveness. Hill, who never accepted donations or compensation for his development work, is another core reason why the extension is as popular as it is right now.
Now You: do you use content blockers?
I used to be an avid fan of Firefox because of the philosophy behind Mozilla but not anymore since several years ago.
Not only they don’t care about users’ privacy anymore, their software is weak too. After all these years, Firefox still sucks at managing RAM :(
I can’t understand some people’s hate for Brave Browser though! I use it to day-trade cryptocurrencies. It’s a good browser; fast and light on resources.
I don’t use Shields however since I always use the undisputed king of content blockers i.e. uBlock Origin. And I’ve noticed that uBO blocks more crappy things (trackers, ads, etc.) than Shields.
Man, you can block ANY element on a web page with uBO! It’s really powerful.
Long live uBO ;)
God bless Satoshi and Raymond Hill!
BTW: If you are on Android, Blockada works great for filtering out most ads and trackers.
One of my favorites plugin, like https everywhere and privacy badger of eff editors.
Is iron_clad_head a racketeer of lame-hacks? Why is this coward shill allowed to run rampant on your no longer owned web site??
Pi-Hole on the network. Ublock Origin on all the browsers. Privacy Badger, Multi Account Containers, Cookie AutoDelete, ClearURLs, LocalCDN…
How the hell did it come to this??? :)
Do you use content blockers?
I’ve been using a blocking hosts file for years as I prefer blocking be done at the OS level for all applications not just the web browser. But also because in general I do not like to install any kind of browser extension as I consider it a security risk.
I was using MVPS hosts for a long time but a couple years ago switched to Steven Black (adware + malware) as it’s a more comprehensive list consolidated from various reputable hosts files.
https://github.com/StevenBlack/hosts/blob/master/readme.md
Nice. Sadly anything that goes mainstream, gets infiltrated and compromised by corporations eventually.
I can see why. it is great extension with very low resource. I use it for blocking tracking ads, and for me works well.
We should pray every day for the uBlock origin developer. It’s a 1-man project. When the man dies in the next hour, then this project is likely to be history.
I said something similar about YouTube DL. Meanwhile, there is a successor that is far superior to YouTube DL.
Not really, blocking ads extensions are a lot. uBlock is just the most popular one.
uBlock also use public ads lists which other blocking extensions use.
YouTube DL is also on the same situation, similiar software with similiar functions are a lot, it’s just the most popular one.
I think it is important to note that a lot of these applications use youtube-dl or some variation of it such as ytd-p as it’s backend so yes, Youtube-DL is very important. There are some other dedicated applications that don’t use ytd but they are few and far between and usually only support a fraction of the websites and features of what ytd does.
@Mystique
Those are called forked softwares. Youtube-DL doesn’t do anything hard, anyone can continue the development, it’s open source. It’s not like they code the software in binaries.
Since, many versions ago, there was rumble of browsers limiting/bypassing blocker ad ons, or ad ons making secret exceptions… I instituted a pi-hole as dns on my lan using an old Pi3b.
After that, I notice 1) I don’t particularly care about browsers and blockers, though I could. 2) I don’t have to preach tech/platform choice at my wife & kids anymore, which is nice as there are other things to argue about. 3) They notice when they’re _not_ behind the pi-hole how many ads they get thrown at them, which makes a dad feel warm and fuzzy. 4) It seems their teenage friends prefer MY wifi to their own home connections – it’s only “adequately” fast (175mbps in an area where 1gbps is available) but they have also remarked on not seeing adverts, and we’ve become the top hangout (which is sh*t for your grocery budget).
I usually use Brave, but have no particular allegiance – I switch browsers for web development all the time and tend to stick with whatever was convenient last.
All of the browsers I use (aside from Brave where it’s “built in”) have UBO installed anyway (predating the pi-hole). I seem to remember some past rift with ABP which prompted me to switch to UBO and it’s all murky past now… which is about the level of attention I think privacy protection SHOULD have: Set and forget.
The internet is a terrible place without uBlock.
This!
I don’t use any blocker; I don’t think this is the answer to ads. Especially with smaller web sites, they depend on revenue from ads. Most ads don’t bother me that much, a few are annoying but not enough to use an ad blocker. If ads start over taking a web page content, then I just don’t go to that web site. When the ads take up almost as much space as the content. Then why bother blocking all that? The site isn’t worth visiting anyway.
It’s not just about ads. Like @Neutrino mentioned, tracking is a large factor. I don’t trust Moz to protect me from anyting, not when I see their browser trying to hit their assets several times a second (ahem, dnscrypt-proxy easily fixes this). But an important factor that also plays into the calculus of block or not is the threat of getting infected with malware delivered via ad networks, which happens allot and comes in waves.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malvertising
There is a reasonable consensus that content blockers are an important method to help protect assets from malware infection.
https://www.malwarebytes.com/malvertising
But personally, I tip my hat to Raymond Hill. Because of his critical tool, the internet has become enjoyable again. Before uBo, ads and tracking are horrific in an internet that has become a useless collage of ad fueled, ugly distraction vying for eyeballs. uBo restored the web to the way it used to be (many of us have been doing this since the 90s before greed took over the internet).
If you want to support a few websites, uBo allows whitelisting. I use it for several sites that deliver non-distracting ads, such as Startpage (I know, but DDG has become useless because it delivers far too many unrelated Russian results in the past few years. In the old days, DDG was great, now.. not so much for me).
You gotta use an script called Google Hit Hider (it works on multiple search engines such as DDG and not just google) for the filtering and blocking of websites in search results. You will soon find better search results. I am aware that there are other extensions but I find that the script works better and has been developed by a good guy that has been around for a very long time.
https://greasyfork.org/scripts/1682-google-hit-hider-by-domain-search-filter-block-sites
I agree with @JohnIL, in fact I always use Ublock origin for non trusted sites or even sites that I didn’t know about their content or security. However for trusted and good sites I use Chrome with no adblockers. They deserve some revenue from ads to continue their tasks and efforts. :]
Oh if it only was for the ads.. but the fact is that adblockers block malware too, like an extra defense layer right there in your browser.
@JohnIL, of course I totally endorse Neutrino’s answer. Also, if you haven’t noticed it in the comments, BillD’s link to a uBO video tutorial is excellent : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2lisQQmWQkY — Do have a look at it. Nowadays you just cannot surf with an OS’s, a browser’s out-of-the-box settings, you really must intervene to keep your privacy (& correlated security) at an acceptable level. Advertising comes next, I understand your point, but don’t forget that advertising can be malvertising as well. Just be cautious. No need to be an expert, today’s tools have been brought to a basic user’s understanding. Be cautious!
It is not about visual annoyance – it’s about tracking people! uBlock blocks trackers and ads. And those “small” websites are most likely using Google’s AdNoSense, or some similar, which tracks people online through installing cookies etc.
And if “they depend on revenue from ads” instead of the quality of the product/service they provide, then screw ’em! There is nothing noble to support such leeches, it’s only naive!
It’s a MUST if you use FF and value your browsing experience.
@Jojo, Here is the information that will help you:
https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki
I have “used” UBlock Origin for sometime. I wish I could figure out how to actually use it. Is there a PDF user manual somewhere? A support forum?
Jojo, I highly recommend this YouTube tutorial. I was an “install and forget it” kind of user, but this vid helped me get comfortable with many of its intermediate/advanced features.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2lisQQmWQkY
@Jojo, uBO’s Wiki is very well done : [https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki]
—
uBlock Origin, adopted ever since its first release. A gem, a savior, first extension I’d ever add.
System-wide : DNSCrypt-proxy with 3 IP blocklists and 5 domain blocklists.
Hi Tom,
in dnscrypt-proxy I’m using the following domain blocklists:
https://gitlab.com/curben/urlhaus-filter/raw/master/urlhaus-filter-domains.txt
https://raw.githubusercontent.com/notracking/hosts-blocklists/master/dnscrypt-proxy/dnscrypt-proxy.blacklist.txt
https://adguardteam.github.io/AdGuardSDNSFilter/Filters/filter.txt
https://phishing.army/download/phishing_army_blocklist_extended.txt
https://raw.githubusercontent.com/anudeepND/blacklist/master/CoinMiner.txt
https://raw.githubusercontent.com/crazy-max/WindowsSpyBlocker/master/data/dnscrypt/spy.txt
https://raw.githubusercontent.com/RPiList/specials/master/Blocklisten/notserious
https://osint.digitalside.it/Threat-Intel/lists/latestdomains.txt
and the following IP blocklists:
https://talosintelligence.com/documents/ip-blacklist
https://rules.emergingthreats.net/blockrules/compromised-ips.txt
https://rules.emergingthreats.net/fwrules/emerging-Block-IPs.txt
https://lists.blocklist.de/lists/all.txt
Which ones are you using?
Hi linuxfan (aka known as dnscryptfan I presume?!). I’m using the following blocklists at this time:
DNSCRYPT-IP LISTS :
Feodo Botnet C2 IP Recommended IP blocklist : https://feodotracker.abuse.ch/downloads/ipblocklist_recommended.txt
Ipsum Daily feed of bad IPs Level 2 : https://raw.githubusercontent.com/stamparm/ipsum/master/levels/2.txt
CINS Army Bad Guys : https://cinsscore.com/list/ci-badguys.txt
DNSCRYPT-DOM LISTS :
DNSCrypt mybase [1] : https://download.dnscrypt.info/blacklists/domains/mybase.txt
Phishing Army Blocklist : https://phishing.army/download/phishing_army_blocklist.txt
WindowsSpyBlocker-extra : https://raw.githubusercontent.com/crazy-max/WindowsSpyBlocker/master/data/dnscrypt/extra.txt
WindowsSpyBlocker-spy : https://raw.githubusercontent.com/crazy-max/WindowsSpyBlocker/master/data/dnscrypt/spy.txt
WindowsSpyBlocker-update : https://raw.githubusercontent.com/crazy-max/WindowsSpyBlocker/master/data/dnscrypt/update.txt
[1] DNSCrypt mybase includes (2022-03-11) :
https://hostfiles.frogeye.fr/firstparty-trackers.txt
https://hosts.oisd.nl/basic/
https://paulgb.github.io/BarbBlock/blacklists/domain-list.txt
https://pgl.yoyo.org/adservers/serverlist.php?hostformat=nohtml
https://raw.githubusercontent.com/nextdns/cname-cloaking-blocklist/master/domains
https://raw.githubusercontent.com/notracking/hosts-blocklists/master/dnscrypt-proxy/dnscrypt-proxy.blacklist.txt
But I happen to change, even if I always keep DNSCrypt mybase, a solid base indeed.
https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki
and:
https://old.reddit.com/r/uBlockOrigin/
https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki
https://github.com/DandelionSprout/adfilt/blob/master/Wiki/SyntaxMeaningsThatAreActuallyHumanReadable.md
The developer of uBlock Origin is a standup guy. It’s definitely an addon/extension that people should take a look at. It was sad to see uMatrix go but I wouldn’t want him to burn himself out trying to maintain the both. Several people have tried to bring back uMatrix for firefox without much success which is a shame.
I’m sorry to hear about the author of the MVPS host file. I wish them well and all the best.
It’s sad when things like this happen and also sad to see the void not being filled by others.
It’s a great opportunity for people to share their fiterlist recommendations. I used to have quite the list built up but haven’t quite got back into it as I am testing constantly testing a few things on another browser.
uBlock Origin is a bandaid fix needed because Mozilla refuses to include an adblocker by default, despite the fact that it would be one of the easiest ways to improve privacy… Can’t hurt daddy Google, can you? Leaving the job to extensions limits the damage to Google because hardly anyone uses extensions (5 million uBlock Origin users within a pool of 200 million Firefox users is not much).
Mozilla, be brave, include an adblocker similar to uBlock Origin by default! Then we’ll talk.
Braave is the best.
In Firefox there is no need for adblocker when it comes to privacy because of dFPI, nowhere to be found in any Chromium browser including Brave. It can be set without about:config. Go to main settings and set ETP protections to strict. That solves fundamental tracking issue.
BTW I’m not saying adblockers are useless, infact the most important. But tracking can be prevented in Firefox without one like in TB.
Plus Librewolf has uBO installed from get-go which is a fork like Brave is.
@Yash
> In Firefox there is no need for adblocker when it comes to privacy because of dFPI, nowhere to be found in any Chromium browser including Brave. It can be set without about:config. Go to main settings and set ETP protections to strict. That solves fundamental tracking issue.
Oh, something like this? A feature that Brave has since 2016…
https://brave.com/privacy-updates/7-ephemeral-storage/
> Oh, something like this? A feature that Brave has since 2016…
which was not enabled by default until recently and covered nothing of any real consequence. Certainly nothing like FPI or Firefox’s reworked network partitioning and Total Cookie Protection. The differences have narrowed, but let’s not be disingenuous on who did what. Brave even acknowledges the work of Mozilla and Tor Project. Just be happy that most browsers are starting to close this insidious tracking
https://blog.torproject.org/tor-browser-advancing-privacy-innovation/
https://privacytests.org/
Oh so Brave has feature since 2016. Good try. I’m astonished by that article which is completely useless and which doesn’t mention a thing about dFPI. Hell they credit Safari, yeah right.
Look no need for a comment war. But Firefox users had the option of FPI albeit through about:config which solves tracking issue for years. And it has dFPI now which IMO is better apart from setting site exceptions. And do you know it is available through main settings so now majority of Firefox users can have benefits.
Plus as always uBO is always available. Even for Android which is better than internal adblocker in Brave.
Look I’m not against Brave. But it is a fork. And even then Librewolf is better coz it includes uBO from default.
@Yash
>Oh so Brave has feature since 2016. Good try. I’m astonished by that article which is completely useless and which doesn’t mention a thing about dFPI. Hell they credit Safari, yeah right.
Mozilla (along with the Tor project) are credited in the blog post, what are you talking about?
>But Firefox users had the option of FPI albeit through about:config which solves tracking issue for years. And it has dFPI now which IMO is better apart from setting site exceptions. And do you know it is available through main settings so now majority of Firefox users can have benefits.
Coooooooooool, Brave blocks all third-party storage (more aggressive than Total Cookie Protection in this case) by default since the first version. No need to go into the settings to enable it manually, something that the average Joe is unlikely to do :)
https://github.com/brave/brave-browser/issues/16310#issuecomment-867269617
>Look I’m not against Brave. But it is a fork. And even then Librewolf is better coz it includes uBO from default.
Yeah, you’re not against Brave…. but if you can spread a bunch of FUD to promote Firefox, you’ll surely do it, right? No idea how the fact that it’s a fork of Chromium is relevant to this “discussion”
Oh man, shut it. Brave didn’t credit dFPI, read the blog first. Second dFPI is more about site isolation and preventing tracking so it doesn’t matter whether that storage is cleared or not. Main point which Brave dev/whoever missed in Github issue.
Bottom line is you can set dFPI through *MAIN* settings in Firefox which prevents fundamental tracking. Plus you can install uBO not just on desktop but on Android as well which is lightning years ahead of Brave’s internal adblocker. Try medium mode in uBO and you’ll notice *real* privacy improvements.
If Brave’s internal adblocker ever adopts uBO’s good features, well good for Brave users.
@Yash
>Oh man, shut it. Brave didn’t credit dFPI, read the blog first.
They did, it’s written word for word: “Firefox in particular recently announced an impressive and comprehensive partitioning strategy”
>. Second dFPI is more about site isolation and preventing tracking so it doesn’t matter whether that storage is cleared or not. Main point which Brave dev/whoever missed in Github issue.
So does Ephemeral Site Storage, it’s not an argument. Clearing the storage when the website is closed (after 30 seconds) is more protective
https://brave.com/privacy-updates/14-partitioning-network-state/#brave-already-partitions-cookies-aggressively
>Bottom line is you can set dFPI through *MAIN* settings in Firefox which prevents fundamental tracking.
No need to do that with Brave
>Plus you can install uBO not just on desktop but on Android as well which is lightning years ahead of Brave’s internal adblocker.
Can you name a feature of uBO that Brave lacks?
>Try medium mode in uBO and you’ll notice *real* privacy improvements.
Brave is able to block third party scripts natively
So Brave’s internal adblocker supposedly stops third party scripts. I guess that ends the debate then, right. Try installing uBO and use medium mode and dynamic filtering. You’ll see what I’m talking about.
Plus again Librewolf which is a fork like Brave is still miles better.
@Yash
As always, it is clear that you don’t use Brave, and thus you have no clue what you are talking about. Brave blocks 3rd party scripts when set to “Standard” and 3rd party & 1st party scripts when set to “Aggressive”.
Furthermore, all this talk about partitioning local data is completely useless no matter which browser is at the center of the debate… Since tracking is 100% achievable server-side, if someone has to put local files into your browser they don’t know what they are doing and have a 2000s mindset. Local data is too easy to defeat either via partitioning (albeit that doesn’t stop 1st party tracking really, a website can access its own local files still with partitioning) or even cookie / other local data clearing upon leaving the website in question. That’s why even Google hates the cookie now and wants to do away with it!
Server-side tracking, especially fingerprinting, is where it’s at these days. Partitioning solves a problem that even Google is not interested in anymore. I have nothing more to say on the matter really, pointless debate.
@Anonymous
First yeah Librewolf team is small, doesn’t add much and everything they do can be done manually by Firefox users themselves. But the main reason I said Librewolf is to stop some users saying oh Firefox doesn’t do this or that. Firefox is a BROWSER which happens to maintain its own ENGINE unlike Brave. So some arguments about defaults are moot coz you know users can change it anyway they want. And this can be done through *main* settings which includes DRM, telemetry, dFPI and others.
So before raising a finger at Librewolf consider this, you can customise Firefox the way you want, even without about:config which makes arguments about Firefox defaults comparing them to Brave redundant.
Second you can add add-on like uBO in any device including Android which is lightning years ahead of Brave’s internal adblocker.
You mention CSS. Well since you haven’t used uBO, here’s a tip – disable JS in settings and block remote fonts. That solves CSS issue completely. Thank me later.
@Iron Heart
Partioning is more than what you wrote. Let’s start with an example – you visit a.com which has Google fonts(rarely blocked coz they aren’t ads). With FPI/dFPI the data left by Google fonts apis stays isolated with a.com. Then you go to b.com which also happens to have Google fonts. But now since site isolation is enabled, prior resources from a.com for Google fonts will not be used(happens in every browser except Firefox with site isolation enabled) but rather new resources. This way both remains isolated and cross-site tracking is prevented. From server side unless FPing are advanced both requests will appear different coz dFPI has other protections as well being part of ETP. With advanced scripts, RFP is the way to go. Of course IP address will be visible all the time but that’s the case for every internet connection, which can only be solved through VPNs and Tor.
Plus you mentioning lack of partition somewhat weakening other user’s claim of Brave having site isolation. Just saying.
In reality I know Brave doesn’t have those protections. But no hate to Brave – other than crypto s**t, they’re doing very well.
Brave doesn’t block 3rd party scripts. IOW Brave has static filtering feature from uBO, but not dynamic filtering. And as someone who has used modes in uBO, let me tell you those really improve privacy.
@Yash
>First yeah Librewolf team is small, doesn’t add much and everything they do can be done manually by Firefox users themselves. But the main reason I said Librewolf is to stop some users saying oh Firefox doesn’t do this or that.
So why you don’t redirect them directly to Arkenfox? It’s better than suggesting a “””fork”””, which IMO, has no purpose. Currently, I don’t see how LibreWolf is relevant to this “discussion”, it’s more of a strawman than anything.
>Firefox is a BROWSER which happens to maintain its own ENGINE unlike Brave.
You’re making this claim like maintaining a rendering engine is an easy task. You need to have funding, resources, and a fairly stable user base.
>So some arguments about defaults are moot coz you know users can change it anyway they want. And this can be done through *main* settings which includes DRM, telemetry, dFPI and others.
It’s only “moot” for the kind of people, like you, who don’t mind changing a lot of prefs (with a user.js or manually) and sacrifice usability for privacy. The average Joe tends to just install a browser and expect it to work, that’s why OOTB is important. This is something that Brave and other privacy-centric browsers have understood for many years
>Second you can add add-on like uBO in any device including Android which is lightning years ahead of Brave’s internal adblocker.
Again, can you name a feature of uBO that Brave lacks?
>You mention CSS. Well since you haven’t used uBO, here’s a tip – disable JS in settings and block remote fonts. That solves CSS issue completely. Thank me later.
Yes, I haven’t used uBO for years. If you really disable JavaScript and CSS in your “setup”, which I highly doubt, you might just want to disconnect yourself from the Internet at this point. You’re making the web way less useful.
>Partioning is more than what you wrote. Let’s start with an example – you visit a.com which has Google fonts(rarely blocked coz they aren’t ads). With FPI/dFPI the data left by Google fonts apis stays isolated with a.com. Then you go to b.com which also happens to have Google fonts. But now since site isolation is enabled, prior resources from a.com for Google fonts will not be used(happens in every browser except Firefox with site isolation enabled) but rather new resources. This way both remains isolated and cross-site tracking is prevented. From server side unless FPing are advanced both requests will appear different coz dFPI has other protections as well being part of ETP. With advanced scripts, RFP is the way to go. Of course IP address will be visible all the time but that’s the case for every internet connection, which can only be solved through VPNs and Tor.
Site isolation is a security feature to mitigate exploits like Spectre, it has nothing to do with what you’re talking about
https://security.googleblog.com/2018/07/mitigating-spectre-with-site-isolation.html
>Plus you mentioning lack of partition somewhat weakening other user’s claim of Brave having site isolation. Just saying. In reality I know Brave doesn’t have those protections.
You’re pretty ignorant, aren’t you? Brave has these protections, I linked 2 blog posts and a Github comment from a developer about it. You didn’t read anything and only cherrypicked what you wanted to debunk, huh? I forgot that you seem to have an agenda of constantly touting Firefox, which you didn’t refute
>Brave doesn’t block 3rd party scripts. IOW Brave has static filtering feature from uBO, but not dynamic filtering. And as someone who has used modes in uBO, let me tell you those really improve privacy.
You just admitted that you never used Brave in one sentence, thanks for playing with yourself
First Librewolf is mentioned for one purpose and that is – so users can stop crying about changing many options in Firefox.
For your average Joe, you can disable telemetry, enable dFPI through main settings. I’ve been consistent in saying this. If your average Joe isn’t even bothered to go to main settings, not about:config mind, then good luck. Even in Brave you have to go to main settings to change stuff.
Second by site isolation, I meant First Party Isolation and dynamic First Party Isolation, i.e. FPI and dFPI. Both of which are for improving privacy and reduce tracking.
Third I only mentioned block remote fonts and disable JS in response to your CSS vulnerability. If you think this is too much, well save for few settings and Tor network, that’s the setup you find in Tor Browser.
We’re not going anywhere like this. Having different opinions is a good thing. And in that respect it was fun having a discussion without any insults. See you later :)
@Iron Heart
I copied a reply you had on December 11, 2020 (sorry don’t have link) on what your Brave setup was. Have you made any changes since then?
Thanks
@Anonymous
No, I haven’t changed anything since then. Brave has made steady progress re. including new privacy features though, like ephemeral storage and protections against bounce tracking, but no user interaction is required to enable these (they are enabled by default). I am thinking about dropping uBlock Origin seeing how Brave supports custom adblocking lists now. See my reply to @ShintoPlasm above: https://www.ghacks.net/2022/03/11/ublock-origin-is-now-the-most-popular-firefox-add-on/#comment-4517065
@Yash
>So Brave’s internal adblocker supposedly stops third party scripts. I guess that ends the debate then, right.
Kinda, since you no longer seem to have any arguments (besides strawman)
>Try installing uBO and use medium mode and dynamic filtering. You’ll see what I’m talking about.
Is this really useful or it’s a gimmick? Enjoy a lot of websites breaking to finally gain little to no privacy benefit
https://matt.traudt.xyz/posts/2016-09-04-how-css-alone-can-help-track-you/
>Plus again Librewolf which is a fork like Brave is still miles better.
LibreWolf is not really a “””fork”””. The only thing their team of volunteers does is apply their own branding, customized configuration, minor patches to remove the “annoyances”, and bundle uBO on top of Firefox, that’s it. Unlike Brave, they don’t develop anything themselves or think about being web compatible
I wont add much because people already gave good arguments but i’ll just leave this here :
https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/facebook-twitter-trackers-whitelisted-by-brave-browser/
AFAIK Firefox tracking protection devs doesn’t make such sneaky move “for compatibility”. They just say “in strict mode websites can break” and let you chose.
> I guess the developer of uBlock Origin knows more about the subject than you:
Fact I: This article just cites the extension API limitations of Chromium. Those API limitations are not applicable to native adblockers (like the one in Brave) as native adblockers are not extensions… For example, Brave does CNAME uncloaking: https://brave.com/privacy-updates/6-cname-trickery/
> Enhanced Tracking Protection is a tracker blocker, not an ad blocker – the name should give you a clue, but yeah, let’s be disingenuous
Firefox’s tracker blocking tracking blocking exists because they are too afraid to include an adblocker similar to uBlock Origin, Brave etc. My point still stands, what you say does not disprove it at all.
> Brave added an adblocker for one reason – to be able to detect ads in order to be able to replace them.
Fact II: Brave does not replace ads on websites, Brave’s ads are system notifications. Brave’s ads are also opt-in and the browser doesn’t show its own ads by default.
Fact III: Websites do not lose any more revenue via Brave than they would via uBlock Origin or any other adblocker.
> Brave is, after all, owned by an advertising company, and not being able to detect ads impacts their business model
Fact IV: Mozilla receives 80%+ of its annual revenue from Google, the biggest ad company in the world.
Fact V: Mozilla does not implement a local ad delivery system that would hurt Google’s revenue.
> Whatever Martin’s posts cover, we can reliably expect your never-ending agitation against Mozilla. It’s getting boring. Really.
Show me the default adblocker of Firefox that is somewhat similar to uBlock Origin or Brave’s adblocker, then. Good luck. Facts can’t be agitation.
> I wont add much because people already gave good arguments but i’ll just leave this here
Fact VI: Brave does not allow Facebook / Twitter / Google trackers, nor is there any kind of monetary agreement between Brave and these companies. In truth, you can’t block each and every script on these pages, as basic functionality breaks. Even Saint Gorhill understands this, which is why uBlock Origin is not blocking the scripts in question either by default, you * [Editor: removed].
> AFAIK Firefox tracking protection devs doesn’t make such sneaky move “for compatibility”. They just say “in strict mode websites can break” and let you chose.
Fact VII: In reality, Firefox does not set the tracking protection to “Strict” by default for compatibility reasons.
The replies I’ve gotten were full of shit, utterly hypocritical, and oftentimes factually wrong. As expected. Just because you are many fans of uBlock Origin / Firefox around here does not mean what you say is anywhere near true. Truth is not determined by majorities. I invite anyone interested to do their own research on the subject, as always.
PS: When Mozilla adopts Manifest V3, which they probably will due to cross-browser extension compatibility, you are screwed. Native adblockers have their purpose, deal with it. E.g. Brave’s internal adblocker used by 50 million people worldwide has hurt Google more in one year than 5 million uBO users ever will. Just saying.
> PS: When Mozilla adopts Manifest V3, which they probably will due to cross-browser extension compatibility, you are screwed. Native adblockers have their purpose, deal with it. E.g. Brave’s internal adblocker used by 50 million people worldwide has hurt Google more in one year than 5 million uBO users ever will. Just saying.
https://blog.mozilla.org/addons/2021/05/27/manifest-v3-update/
“One of the most controversial changes of Chrome’s MV3 approach is the removal of blocking WebRequest, which provides a level of power and flexibility that is critical to enabling advanced privacy and content blocking features. Unfortunately, that power has also been used to harm users in a variety of ways. Chrome’s solution in MV3 was to define a more narrowly scoped API (declarativeNetRequest) as a replacement. However, this will limit the capabilities of certain types of privacy extensions without adequate replacement.
Mozilla will maintain support for blocking WebRequest in MV3. To maximize compatibility with other browsers, we will also ship support for declarativeNetRequest. We will continue to work with content blockers and other key consumers of this API to identify current and future alternatives where appropriate. Content blocking is one of the most important use cases for extensions, and we are committed to ensuring that Firefox users have access to the best privacy tools available.”
Of course we’ll just have to wait and see how it turns out in the end. As we know, Mozilla hasn’t exactly “kept their word” on quite a few occasions. At the same time, they also have on many others. I doubt they will forsake their #1 addon in uBlock like chrome has.
@Iron Heart
Impressive rant you procured in such a short time. But Brave is not an option, as it doesn’t work, as previous independent posters already co-confirmed with various sources.
Unless you procure some audit that is NOT by Brave itself, keep barking up the wrong tree matey :^)
Hey do you get those rewards for your posts? I read Brave paid its users via the Uphold wallet. Is that your motivation behind this endless spin against Moz? I mean I won’t like Mozilla is treating Firefox pretty poorly, but heck, at least my browser is not part of a botnet, and I can turn off Pocket and Activity Stream with 1 easy trick in about:config
> Me: Facts
> You: Impressive rant you procured in such a short time.
Whatever you say, buddy. Confront the facts or bust.
> But Brave is not an option, as it doesn’t work, as previous independent posters already co-confirmed with various sources.
The sources posted here are unrelated (gorhill only talks about extension limitations not applicable to native adblockers) or FUD (Brave whitelisting trackers is just not true). Nice sources you have there.
50 million+ users and rapid growth also prove that Brave just doesn’t work. Good graces, wow. LOL.
> Unless you procure some audit that is NOT by Brave itself, keep barking up the wrong tree matey :^)
> Open source
> audit despite it being open source already
> Where is Firefox’s audit even
> Hey do you get those rewards for your posts?
Was there no other way for you to declare intellectual bankruptcy?
> Is that your motivation behind this endless spin against Moz?
No. You don’t get rich via Brave nor via any other browser. And “Moz” gives me all the strong reasons to criticize them for free already. Deplatformingfox, sponsored by Google, asking for donations that never actually go to Firefox development, while the board enriching themselves while firing developers all the same, no privacy by default despite all the propaganda to the contrary etc. etc. What is not to like here? Hehe, no reasons at all, if one is completely blind I guess.
@IH
Your insolence amuses me :)
Give it a rest Iron Heart. No-one here enjoys your garbage spamming, not to mention insulting everyone
@marysueellen
> Give it a rest Iron Heart.
It’s good to know that nobody here can deal with the facts in an appropriate way, like children. That includes you.
But yeah, enough redpilling and fact checking for one day.
Sigh. Whatever Martin’s posts cover, we can reliably expect your never-ending agitation against Mozilla. It’s getting boring. Really.
Regarding the built-in adblocker in Brave: I’m not saying it’s bad, it really isn’t. However, it’s definitely missing (at least) 2 great uBO features, namely Dynamic (URL) Filtering and the Logger. They are indispensable for power users. But you probably don’t belong to them.
Enhanced Tracking Protection is a tracker blocker, not an ad blocker – the name should give you a clue, but yeah, let’s be disingenuous
Brave added an adblocker for one reason – to be able to detect ads in order to be able to replace them. Brave is, after all, owned by an advertising company, and not being able to detect ads impacts their business model
Whatever your opinion of Mozilla/Brave, let’s be clear about one thing: Brave does **not** replace ads on webpages, and never has.
Try Vivaldi.
I guess the developer of uBlock Origin knows more about the subject than you:
https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/uBlock-Origin-works-best-on-Firefox
So who do I trust? Raymond Hill or some Brave shill?
Actually the number of users is much higher.
See:
https://blog.mozilla.org/addons/2020/06/10/improvements-to-statistics-processing-on-amo/
and:
https://www.ghacks.net/2020/06/26/here-is-why-the-user-count-dropped-for-nearly-all-firefox-add-ons/
Users that have telemetry disabled are not counted.
@nicolaasjan
No, that is nonsense (like so much in this comment section). Mozilla can determine the exact number of uBlock Origin by counting the uBO-related requests to addons.mozilla.org whenever the extension updates itself. No need for in-browser telemetry at all.
Plus, Firefox’s telemetry just evaluates whether or not you have any extension installed at all, not uBlock Origin specifically.
Brave is the best.
They count daily users so only people with ublock installed and active
uBlock Origin + MVPS Hosts file with a bunch of added stuff to it. Although the maintainer of the hosts file seems to be seriously ill, the file hasn’t been updated in a year and there’s a message on his site about his condition. I hope he is doing better, been using his file for many many years and I am not aware of a similar alternative. uBlock Origin even has the same file as an extra filter option so it’s widely known/used..Maybe someone here has more information?
The MVPS hosts file [https://winhelp2002.mvps.org/hosts.htm] has not been updated since March-06-2021.
This makes me question wether anyone is still working on it.
@Blockeroony
I recommend these two actively maintained lists that are also in uBO’s defaults (Multipurpose):
Dan Pollock’s hosts file
and:
Peter Lowe’s Ad and tracking server list
@nicolaasjan
I wouldn’t recommend Peter Lowe’s list, personally. Seems to be a bit too overzealous with the blocking. Dan Pollock’s has been fine, though.
I hope he will get better soon too.
Not anymore. gorhill removed MVPS from the lists.
https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/commit/858fdaced3fbaf2d4c16aaa71cdab2b050e890b7
Adguard + uBlock Origin for ad blocking and some web annoyances…
uBlock Origin works best on Firefox – https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/uBlock-Origin-works-best-on-Firefox
@Service Pack Bot
This article talks about API limitations of Chromium and can’t serve as a plausible basis for comparison between uBlock Origin and native adblockers or any other adblocker.
The article just about uBlock Origin (Firefox) vs. uBlock Origin (Chrome) which is hardly interesting at all, because all Chromium adblockers are under these limitations and it’s a known thing. Interesting is uBlock Origin vs. Brave (internal) or uBlock Origin vs. Pi-Hole, for example.
Brave.
uBlock Origin works best on Firefox – https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/uBlock-Origin-works-best-on-Firefox
uBlock Origin works best on Firefox than Brave. Full stop.
Brave has a native adblocker. Nobody cares. The argument here is where the addon work better and it’s on Firefox. Deal with it cryptoscammer.
@Service Pack Bot
> uBlock Origin works best on Firefox than Brave. Full stop.
Nobody on Brave needs uBlock Origin tbf. Only the “privacy browser” needs the bandaid to begin with.
@IH:
Strangely, I’m finding Brave’s built-in adblocker to be less effective against Twitter ‘promoted tweets’ and LinkedIn ‘promoted posts’, even when set to Aggressive. uBO and Adguard do block these out of the box. Any idea why?
@ShintoPlasm
Check out whether or not you want to enable more lists on brave://adblock/ (hamburger menu –> Brave adblocker).
You can also add more lists from here: https://filterlists.com/ (under “View” you can get to the list’s URL)
There’s no better privacy browser than Tor. Tor + uBlock is almost like living in the free world again.
Reply to (Anonymous) – Replier 7
Don’t use TOR with UBo, it’s dumb to do that for such a focused anonymity browser.
@Service Pack (I love that pseudo BTW!), I agree with John G., no need to use both (I’d even advise to not to). This said tou can perfectly add AdGuard lists to uBlock Origin :
AdGuard Ad Filters : https://kb.adguard.com/en/general/adguard-ad-filters
How about running uBlock with ‘Privacy Badger’ and ‘ClearURLs’ on Firefox?
@michlin, I run uBlock Origin together with ‘Privacy Possum’ (not ‘Privacy Badger’) and ‘ClearURLs’ flawlessly and I believe efficiently given there’s no overlap or partial only.
Because of ‘Privacy Possum’ I disable ClearURL’s ‘Filters ETag headers from requests’ given the former handles ETags more smartly than the latter, IMO.
Why not Privacy Badger? : [https://github.com/cowlicks/privacypossum#why-not-privacy-badger]
No Adguard addon is needed if Ublock origin is installed. Memory consumption is high and the blocked items are too small for the resources cost.