Google 'Updates' Privacy Policy - Goodbye Google for some?

AFAIK it works more or less exactly like Opera's internal adblocking file. I have experimented with adding Fanboy's Opera adblocking List actually in Opera. It seems to actually work relatively well. Something unusual for Opera. A while ago I didn't have much success with attempting the same thing with Opera. According to people I have spoken to about this, it could be primarily because Opera consistently changes its .ini file.

 

When that first happened, I'd briefly searched around looking for others with the same problem. I honestly thought that was some quirk with my system. Nice to see it wasn't just me going crazy! Yes, it seems solved on version 16 for Windows and I'd never had the problem prior to version 14.

Neither could I, and the Iron devs responded to only one of my questions (of 3 sent) and it was for more info anywhere on the privacy.ini file. I even sent an admittedly long winded way of asking why they chose to omit Native Client. I didn't translate it into German and I know that's the devs' first language, but I got no response. Same thing with the adblock file. I have no experience with Opera's.

The most I've found is this thread on Iron's forum, which doesn't say much.

http://www.srware.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=2822&sid=189eb85f3fcfc9d624436239051b6474

When I used Iron on my own machines, I used the adblock.ini with Fanboy lists. It was very simple and transparent, I didn't like updating it often though and the Fanboy lists update daily. It doesn't take long and there's no obligation to do it daily, but I'd rather have it automated. That said, there's a script on the Iron forums someone wrote for auto updating the adblock.ini but it's for Opera and needs to be adapted to Iron. The .ini doesn't have a memory footprint so that's a plus and it blocks the domains at the page request. I don't remember anything coming through and then disappearing like Adblock Plus stable does sometimes.

For resource starved systems, the adblock.ini would be a good idea but you have to maintain it. If you can afford the ~100MB of RAM that the Adblock Plus extension sometimes needs, then I'd personally go with that. Just my $0.2.

 

See, what is getting me is that it seems to be more efficient than Palant's ABP. So why doesn't he or anyone else make it available for Chrome as well? Just a thought because I rely on Privoxy for most of my blocking but Privoxy has its limitations in that it doesn't filter https. So a little light-weight something else would be nice for Chrome.

 

I think it affected quite a few people, it did seem to be worse on certain sites. IMDb (a regularly visited favourite of mine) was one of the main offenders. Whenever there is a new Iron update I often check to see if it works properly in IMDb first!

I seem to remember a promised auto-updater from the Iron devs, I don't know what's happened to that. It may have just been in my imagination though.

Iron's .ini file is very good, but you can't easily switch it off & it is a bit of a pain in the arse to update LOL.

 

ABP uses 8-30MB of RAM (depends on how many tabs you have open, I've never seen it at 100.) I would assume that the adblock.ini is loaded into RAM as well and probably works like a host file.

 

For me, it's not about the RAM. I'm just wondering why no one else, Chrome clones or extension writers, are making this technique more available if it's open source and doable...

 

Because there's probably some downside to it (besides updating being a pain.) I really don't know how it works or even if it even works any better than ABP without WebRequest would. They don't really say and apparently they don't even release source code...

 

Is that based on the "plug" or did you do a little digging yourself? It would be nice to know from advocates of this browser whether it is open source or not. No point searching if it's closed.

 

Google tries to explain but ...

http://articles.cnn.com/2012-01-27/...-browser-privacy-tools-search-data?_s=PM:TECH
but ...

So there are people smart enough to be concerned about privacy but who have trouble logging off from their Goog accounts when they want to protect their privacy.

 

@Hungry Man. I've seen Adblock Plus stable reach as much as 110 MB in RAM. I have no idea why and this wasn't too long ago, early 2011 I was using it personally. The memory management has gotten better over it's history though, I think that can be said confidently. I have no screen shots to back this up with however. I use the experimental and it stays around 15-20 MB.

I agree that the .ini is likely like a hosts file type of implementation. There's little difference in used RAM between with .ini and not. Here's Iron 16 with the adblock & Fanboy list.
http://i43.tinypic.com/skwzo9.png

Here's it without.
http://i39.tinypic.com/no7ekp.png

The .ini is virtually undetectable, and the used ram for each Chrome process is always changing but not by much. It does block stuff but it's difficult to compare directly to webrequest & ABP exp. I don't know. That's the best I can say so for now, it will have to remain a mystery. I didn't think to look for it in Iron's src files when I had them. Oops!

@Vasa, very good point about others not picking up the idea.

A link to the source code is in the "plug" and on SRWare's site. Down at the bottom.
http://www.srware.net/en/software_srware_iron_download.php

 

I don't want to quibble but I'm not sure it's anything like a hosts file purely because it handles wildcards (and regex). So the list won't need to have www.tracker1.com, www.tracker2.com, www.tracker3.com, etc. but just .*\.tracker.*\.com or something like that.

 

My bolding. Really ! No NOT really. What i "presume" they actually mean to say is, it won't be collected in the EXACT same way. I find it hard to believe that Google has stopped archiving etc peoples searches etc & recording corresponding IP etc data ! In which case, Any/All data tracking can still be linked to a particular person/s.

No more! Just the same as before then = LOTS

vasa1 posted the above link in here - https://www.wilderssecurity.com/showthread.php?t=317270 - Probably better in here though

*

My bolding. Since when ? I don't believe it.

 

Well, all I'm going to say is that the other day I just clicked on a YouTube link, which purportedly showed Cheryl Cole farting on the X-Factor, & now Google think that I want to watch women with an apparent flatulence problem on the telly from all over the world!

Just what does Google thinking it's playing at? Is this some attack on female TV presenters who eat a lot of beans? Does Google have no shame? Irritable bowel syndrome is not a joke!

Anyway, back on planet Earth ... wouldn't Fanboy himself be the logical person to ask about Iron's .ini file?

 

Logic, commonsense, intuitive not. The only person I'd trust is the person who recommends Iron all the time

Fanboy isn't an SR Iron dev, is he

 

I don't think that it is beyond the realms of human rationality to talk to the bloke who actually compiles the .ini filter list for Iron. I have had conversations with him in the past & he seems very knowledgeable.

No, I believe he's a Kiwi. I mean we're all Commonwealth right? LOL!

 

Does he compile the .ini filter list specifically <i>for</i> Iron or do Iron users just use the list that he makes available for ABP users
(I am beginning not to care seeing as how it seems to be some sort of inner circle thing. I'll just sulk ... and continue Firefox using SimpleBlock in conjunction with Privoxy.)

 

You've probably forgotten more about computers than I'll ever know, so I am not too sure about this, but I am fairly certain that the list has to be tailored somewhat to the specific browser .ini file. For example, I doubt that you can just paste the Opera .ini list into Iron's file & vice versa. If I remember correctly from conversations I had with Fanboy a while back, this was a problem with his Opera .ini list. He reckoned that the Opera file changes with successive upgrades & the list has to be modified accordingly. He seems to have cracked it in Opera now as his list does seem to work on my notebook. Not that I use Opera very frequently, or at all these days.

I'm sure we'll figure this all out eventually.

 

"Microsoft ad campaign savages Google over privacy" : http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/02/01/ms_attack_ads_google_privacy/

 

Well, while I tend to agree with Frank ~

"The changes Google announced make it harder, not easier, for people to stay in control of their own information,".

I also remember ~ 'how Microsoft was once seen as the creepy data-mining uberlord - not so long ago.' as well.

I'm pretty sure Google are going to lose users over this new policy.

 

You are right Daveski17...none of them are "angels"

 

Yes, I also don't understand why people will doggedly defend these companies if you even hint at criticising them. I have both criticised & praised both Microsoft & Google in the past. I think that being able to criticise a company over privacy or hegemonic practises is only fair. I often criticise Google, it doesn't mean to say that I am averse to using their products though. People have told me that they couldn't believe that I could ever use Chrome because I am a bit worried about Google's policies. I've got nothing against it as a browser, especially now most of the spyware has gone! Either way, I am quite concerned about this new Google privacy policy & it does make me less likely to use Gmail for a start. This could just be a tad irrational, I accept.

 

One of the things that really got on my nerves about Google, I think it was a couple of years ago, was when Eric Schmidt said something to the effect that people shouldn't be worried about privacy if they had nothing to hide, or weren't doing anything wrong. That's complete rubbish...it's tantamount to saying that if you have curtains/drapes on your home's windows you must be up to something dodgy inside!

 

It's good to see Microsoft come out openly the way they have rather than do it by proxy.