ghostery or fanboy list for firefox

hya

which setup is better? using ghostery OR fanboy-annoyances+fanboy-tracking?

atm i am using both , BUT maybe its over kill ?


cheers

 

Well i use them both .

 

i read you can achieve same results by disabling some option in firefox like "get cookie from third party ..." under privacy , also a claim its slow down browsing ... so what the true in this 2 plugins ?

cheers

 

Well I can say my browsing speed seems to be the same.
I have been using boy-annoyances+fanboy-tracking for a long time
and using ghostery since firefox 6 .0
As for if u can achieve same results in Firefox without these 2 plugins
I done know ,,

 

Actually, yes, if you forbid 3rd party cookies in the privacy settings of Firefox, it does help some. However, Flash cookies are still an issue to be considered. An extension like BetterPrivacy helps here, and, now you can also delete them from Flash settings itself. As to Ghostery and Fanboys tracking lists, In my opinion, if you're using the tracking lists (including the international one), Ghostery is likely not going to do much. Ghostery seems to be limited to a certain amount of the "major known" trackers, where Fanboy lists seem to go more in depth, as entries are added by the many users of ABP/Fanboy lists.

The only time you'll get slowdowns is by using far too many lists in ABP, or if you're blocking 3rd party scripts (via Noscript and such), which continually try to load. Otherwise, using these lists will actually speed you up, as you are bypassing the multitudes of 3rd party ad trackers and other crap that infest modern websites.

 

dw426

i am using BetterPrivacy , so all flash to the trash after firefox is closing it self.
i may take your advice and check only with fanboy privacy lists + 3rd disable in ff option and see whats is going on

btw

if i am using ad muncher , so still i need any fanboy track list protection?


10x for the help

 

Agreed. With blocked 3rd party and flash cookies and the ABP tracking lists (like Fanboy's or EasyPrivacy) Ghostery is simply superfluous.

 

The "in moderation" saying applies here. These block lists can speed up your browsing as long as you don't over-do it. I personally only use EasyList, EasyPrivacy & Malware Domains, and I believe my browsing is actually quicker this way than without. And I choose Ghostery over Fanboy's list. I think the way I have it is effective without being too cumbersome and crossing that "moderation" line.

And for whatever slowdown NoScript is causing, I get that back and then some by going without a real-time AV, which I feel safe doing thanks to NS + Sandboxie.

 

I've never had the best luck with the Easy lists. I guess it comes down to the websites you visit. I would not personally use Noscript in place of an AV, for two reasons. The first being that script-based malware isn't the only game in town, there are downloads and such to contend with that Noscript is useless against. My second reason is that Noscript use, without experience and seeing the same 3rd party scripts over and over again, is still very much a guessing game when it comes to problematic websites.

Let's take an example, Addicting Games, which is a legitimate website. Let's say you go there using Noscript. First of all, the site won't work. Why? Because it uses scripts, 1st and 3rd party like 99% of websites do. Well, hmm, you figure Noscript is causing that, and you have 3 scripts to choose to allow. 1. addictinggames.com 2. optimizely.com 3. webads.nl

Now, common sense will generally allow us to figure out addictinggames.com needs to be allowed. But what about the other two? Which one will allow the site to function properly? Which one is a simple ad server? Which of the two might be malware just waiting for you to click "Allow"? Well, the answer here is that both of those are ad servers, and for most of the game there, can be left as "Forbidden". I know this by experience, but a first time user will not know, and, therefore opens him/herself up to attack.

That example is a very, very simple one. However, a good portion of times, you will be faced with 5, 6, possibly more scripts to choose from. This is the weak point of the extension, and where the user, much like with HIPS software, is in charge of their own destiny.

 

dw426

that why i found noscript so lame , you never know for SURE which script is 100% safe and which is and adv server .

 

Yes, it's not always easy to decide what to whitelist. On the other hand: If dw426 writes ...

... my answer is: Who cares if addictinggames.com works without them? Why should I whitelist them on a trial basis although that's obviously not necessary? This "common sense" applies to most sites, IMHO. Granted, there are more complicated cases. But if you're unsure what to allow you can easily open the Noscript menu, middle-click the entry in question and you'll get a result like this one. A great feature which most Noscript users are unaware of.

 

You'll care when you get a few pages in, and random games require another script to work. That's another "gotcha", you can be on one page on a website, with a certain set of scripts, go to page 2, and you might find an extra one, two, three. The feature you brought up would be incredibly nice, if it gave you more than just WOT/SiteAdvisor-type ratings. For most scripts, you get a simple yes or no about malware hosting (Webmaster Tips and Site Information is really the only reliable source).

Besides, if they are already annoyed by whitelisting scripts on a website, a user is not likely to add the extra, annoying step of middle-clicking every last script on a page and hunting down reliable information from the few sources Noscript gives you. Try having a user do that at TMZ.com or someplace with a lot of scripts.

Don't take it to mean I'm badmouthing Noscript. It works, and it works well for those who are careful and patient. For the other 98% of users, it's a roadblock on the information highway, and most people will simply plow through it and ignore it.

 

I would personally never be on that site allowing random scripts to get the functionality to work in the first place, and putting myself at that risk. I rarely allow scripts on any site. The only exceptions are 1'st party needed to log in, for example here, Amazon, ect... on a temporary basis. For somebody visiting shady sites and allowing random scripts to get functionality to work, then yeah, NoScript becomes pretty moot. But I don't blame the add-on for that. It's not aimed at that type of end user. For this reason I never recommend it to other people. But it suits my needs quite well.

Also I don't use NS solely as a replacement for a real-time AV, but along with other things (like Sandboxie), and my habits as an end user, an AV is pretty much worthless bloat to me.

 

Well, the situation is this. With advertising on the net being as pervasive as it is, there are few places that don't require a 3rd party script or two to get full functionality. Also, many times, the use of a single drop down menu on a website requires a different script than the main one. It's not as cut and dry as "Well, all these scripts being needed must mean the site is shady" or "I'll go elsewhere". Government websites, banks, even "trusted" sources like a software vendors' payment functions more often than not require several scripts to be allowed.

I liken it to the "shell game". The shell game is fun, but these days you might pick the wrong one and find an angry rattlesnake under it, rather than nothing at all.

 

That's not how I see it. It's 3rd party scripts from advertising services that are normally NOT needed to get full functionality - blocking them can be usually done without negative side-effects. As a matter of fact I've added a lot of them (like doubleclick etc.) to the Untrusted blacklist of Noscript in order to have a cleaner menu. There are other 3rd party services like googleapis or yahooapis or brightcove that are often needed but have nothing to do with ads.

 

Advertising was a poor example, I admit that. But you made my point anyway, there are plenty of needed 3rd party scripts, and, unless you've dealt with them before, you're not going to know what's alright and what isn't.

 

I don't personally need to know what's alright and what isn't. Even 1'st party scripts are rarely required to use a website, at least the ones I visit. And if I don't need them, I simply don't allow them. There are probably a dozen sites that I use regularly, and I can only think of 1 3'rd party script I ever need to allow for functionality, it's "ytimg" (sp?), or something like that, to log into Youtube. There was 1 other one when I initially set up WOT too. The only time I really even need to allow 1'st party scripts is to check email, or log into 2-3 sites. Even the torrent site I use requires no scripts or cookies to download the torrent files.

Even if you happen to allow a bad script past your guard, without NS that sucker would've loaded automatically without your say-so anyway.

The reasons you point out are why I don't recommend NoScript to other people though... or an outbound FW, or a HIPS, or Sandboxie. I won't put anything that requires user interaction on anyone elses computer. They'll just end up getting ~ Snipped as per TOS ~ and uninstalling it after they realize it takes a few extra mouse clicks to get their porn site to work. NS wasn't made with them in mind though. It was made for me.