Browser choice

Development
1

Hello. browser choice - brilliant solution! This will close discussions about a secure browser, and new users will be able to get acquainted with new browsers that they did not know about. I would like to add 2 sentences for consideration:

  1. Add a signature “proprietary” or “not open source” if there are proprietary browsers in the list. I agree that describing browsers will be redundant due to possible bias, but information about the code is not biased and is very important in assessing security (browsers do not write about proprietary code on their own sites). This will allow new users to assess the risks of installing Google Chrome, Vivaldi, Opera, Yandex Browser… This information can be taken from the site alternativeto.net

  2. Add a browser selection to open-link-confirmation. Users will be able to choose Tor Browser or Mullvad Browser with VPN for suspicious links. To have Tor Browser in the list, you can pre-install torbrowser-launcher in Kicksecure or use only torbrowser-launcher for Tor Browser installation from “browser choice” (manual installation from the site Tor Project | Download does not add the browser to bin)

Thank you!

2

Thanks for the feedback! One note:

Add a signature “proprietary” or “not open source” if there are proprietary browsers in the list.

The current plan is to not include proprietary browsers in the list at all.

2 Likes
3

:+1:

4

You can add that this is a list of open-source browsers. You might be surprised, but many linux users consider Vivaldi the best secure browser. They will be surprised not to see it on the list

5

Context:

That’s a good idea.

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Hello. Will you add Librewolf and Ungoogled Chromium?

1 Like
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Inclusion criteria are mostly defined but still up for debate to some degree. See:

The main thing I’d want to make sure is that the projects had sufficient manpower to be maintained into the foreseeable future and that their version lag was sufficiently low to avoid users being left with zero-days in their browser for any unnecessary period of time.

1 Like
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These are popular browsers that are constantly updated and have been around for a long time. Versions are up‑to‑date, and these browsers have large community and have been passing privacy tests regularly for many years: https://privacytests.org/

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It lists many browsers which definitely fail the criteria for inclusion into browser choice due to not being Open Source.

For clarification…

Non-Goal: Having a complete list of browsers for the sake of completeness alone.

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I gave an example with this site to show that the versions are up‑to‑date and are regularly updated. Otherwise those browsers wouldn’t have made the list. You should know that Librewolf is the most popular Firefox fork, and many users prefer a Ungoogled Chromium over Brave because of Brave’s poor reputation in the past. Check the rating of the Ungoogled Chromium on GitHub. I’m not suggesting any obscure, niche browsers - these browsers have been leaders in numerous privacy rankings for a long time. I’m not insisting, but my friends and I use these browsers for everyday work in Kicksecure

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Mullvad isn’t suitable for daily work use because of its incognito mode. That leaves users with Firefox for YouTube and social media, but Firefox includes telemetry and doesn’t enable tab-containers by default - Librewolf solves those problems. Many users prefer Chromium‑based browsers for speed and security, but the standard Chromium browser includes Google services, and Brave have hidden telemetry - Ungoogleed Chromium solves those problems.

1 Like
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How does that website show when the version (Firefox or Chromium) they’re based on is updated versus when they re-base their fork?

Is this an assumption or fact? Citation required.

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I agree with you. I use Librewolf for daily activity. Mullvad is an excellent browser, but it always runs in incognito mode and always runs NoScript – sometimes it breaks elements on specific sites

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Browser Choice in SYSMAINT session displays a choice of Chromium by Google, Firefox… Brave isn’t worth a mention here (although it may be good for n00bs, sure).

So, how come that there isn’t Ungoogled Chromium and FirefoxESR in Kicksecure-Xfce? Wouldn’t this make sense to use, instead of the horrible regular ones?

I’m just browsing, testing… it’s a great idea to use a distro in this way, love the project, ty.

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No, definitely not Librewolf. No comment as to why (yes, it’s the developer).

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Firefox ESR is present, it’s under the Firefox entry and is provided by the Debian repos.

Ungoogled Chromium has yet to be evaluated for suitability. Rough criteria can be seen at:

2 Likes
17

A post was split to a new topic: Firefox ESR versus Librewolf

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A post was split to a new topic: Firefox ESR versus Librewolf

I did that to avoid this development forum discussion to become too much of a this versus that browser wars.

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Brave Browser is a better choice then Google Chrome since it has its own onion debian repository that it can be installed and updated from it just requires the correct tor apt configuration in the sources list. But again thats a choice lol I would say as long as chromium is being installed via the debian repo and not a manual .deb download page I read people recommend to install it I would it’s fine. If only ungoogled-chromium was in the debian repo I would suggest it over Brave possibly.

20

Librewolf, Mullvad, and Brave all have their own repositories and I think are best choices in my opinion just by that fact alone. Firefox and Chromium are both in the debian Apt. These five make the most sense and I would add or suggest tb-updater for downloading Tor Browser.

Does browser choice depend on it or is it separated from it? Might want to clarify that for users. The only caveat is if you like to have multiple Tor Browser instances there is no way to set the folder path to download it to other then .tb folder in home folder in regards to tb-updater.