Facebook Plunges Again
Tumblr 101: Tips And Tricks To Get Started
Iron: Chrome for privacy fanatics
If you want to use Google Chrome but are concerned or have questions about Google's policies for collecting usage data, you might want to give Iron a try.Iron, developed by German software company SRWare is Chrome stripped of all the user ID information that gave the German government cause for concern.
I don't speak German, but the guys at the Incomplete-News Project have helpfully published an English translation. According to them, Iron is essentially the Chromium source code, with the following modifications:
- No unique user-ID
- No user-specific information is sent to Google
- No alternative error messages
- Crash information is not sent to Google
- No Google updater
I downloaded Iron, and other than featuring the same squished blue logo that CodeWeavers uses in its version of Chromium on the default tab page, everything worked exactly as expected.
XP and Vista users can download Iron from SRWare's site.
[via the Incomplete-News Project]
Comments
9
Subscribe to commentsblankshootingSep 24th 2008 2:28PM
great tip! and totally agree, google's probably already being evil in its ways of collecting usage data through the search options in firefox and safari. boo!
ScottSep 24th 2008 3:22PM
Better yet, try UnChrome:
www.abelssoft.net/unchrome.php
Reviewed by Martin at gHacks, here:
www.ghacks.net/2008/09/07/google-chrome-anonymizer
ScottSep 24th 2008 3:49PM
My mistake - wrong one. This is the one I was thinking of:
http://blog.gjl-network.net/blog/index.php?archives/166-English.html&serendipity[lang_selected]=en
fanboySep 25th 2008 6:15AM
Interesting, the site uses google analytics and google ads, irony.
Danny SullivanSep 25th 2008 2:02PM
The story you link to about the German government has nothing to do with the user ID issue. The German government quite simply didn't think people should use beta software (apparently, the German government doesn't know much about the web) and that it didn't think people should use a browser that's from Google because somehow that would magically add more of their information to Google. Of course, I don't think they issued a similar warning not to use the IE8 beta from Microsoft, to which all the same exact arguments against Google could be applied.
Christina WarrenSep 25th 2008 2:13PM
OK, awesome. I was unable to parse the whole text, not speaking German, and thought it had to be something more than it being in beta. That it isn't is like, disturbing.
Thanks for the clarification!
Seth KnoxDec 19th 2008 12:25PM
The Berliner Zeitung article does mention the government's concern about Chrome's beta status and Google's data-gathering practices (I'm not weighing in on whether those concerns are valid). However, a significant portion of the article concerns security holes in Chrome, especially concerning the handling of financial data.
CRGDec 22nd 2008 10:14PM
Amazing! Just like government to make a decision that people shouldn't use beta software.
torrentSep 26th 2008 10:33AM
Source Code available
http://thepiratebay.org/torrent/4414439
please seed