Category Archives: internet

A small collection of Firefox add-ons you can install to improve (a little bit) your privacy – Part 2

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I already described the privacy concerns related to Flash files in the my last post about Firefox add-ons and privacy. Today I want to talk about some interesting Firefox add-ons that could be helpful to reduce privacy risks during Internet navigation.

The first add-on is Flash Control  that “controls as and when to display the Flash player and the HTML5 player”. Another similar add-on is Flashblock  that does not allow Flash player to send information about your computer until you will decide to allow it. Personally I prefer Flash Control that is very intuitive and you decide when and what to watch just clicking on the Flash icon in the middle of the player. 

But, if you are a purist and you want to be able to control not only Flash player but also Javascript, SilverLight, images and proxies, QuickJava is what you are looking for. QuickJava is intuitive, easy to control and really effective.

In fact, you must not  underestimate Javascripts that are dangerous too if you think that they are equally able to remotely discover many information about your Ip, User-Agent, Architecture, OS Language, System Time, Screen Resolution. Statistically, when you have all these details, you have semi-unique fingerprints of the computer… and so someone could be also able to  know who are you. For this reason an add-on as Disable WebRTC is recommended because it blocks JavaScripts to access your local IP(s), without any user prompt.

References:

https://discourse.mozilla-community.org/t/support-flash-control/2479

http://flashblock.mozdev.org/ 

http://quickjavaplugin.blogspot.com/ 

https://addons.mozilla.org/it/firefox/addon/happy-bonobo-disable-webrtc/?src=api 

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Precious Web reference to configure Ubuntu and mount Pogoplug as “local”disk

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It’s a pity that Pogoplug dismissed its official application for Linux some years ago. It was really useful and easy to install. But, as usual, Linux geeks discovered how to solve the matter and mount Pogoplug drives as “local” disks on Linux. I already wrote about this topic in a previous post in 2012.

But recently, after I installed Ubuntu 14.04 LTS,  I had some problems with Pogoplug and I realized that the way I previously adopted was not able to mount Pogoplug as local disk. I searched on Internet and I found a good post  that is really self explicative about this topic. With a bunch of minutes I was able to connect again Pogoplug to my computer as local disk and, after some tests, I must say that the solution described by Linerd its really effective and stable. 

Good work Linerd!

References:

https://tuxtweaks.com/2013/06/mount-your-pogoplug-on-linux/

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Internet Trends 2015

Pandora for “dummies”…. when you are outside the USA… – Firefox, Chrome and Opera add-on –

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The last time I wrote a post about connecting to Pandora  when you are outside the USA was just (sic) three years ago. Meanwhile a lot of things changed and Anonymox, the Firefox add-on and proxy service I suggested in 2012, it is not free now.

It happens but when my nephew asked me something similar and really intuitive to connect to Pandora I was in trouble… more in trouble than I could imagine…. In fact when I started to search something alternative, I found a lot of very good proxy add-ons for Firefox. It was a pleasure to discover some of them because they are technically well done and offer a lot of flexible features for privacy purpose. But this is not the topic of my post… for today.

After many unlucky trials, where I tested different add-ons that were not able to guarantee a minimal rate of usable connection,  I found ProxMate .

ProxMate is an open-source, SSL proxy manager for real dummies. As Firefox add-on you can install it on your browser in just few clicks and then you practically don’t need to configure anything. The only requested thing after installation is to decide the websites and services you want to connect through ProxMate. The internet connection has a good speed rate and the music flows as silk through your Pandora account.

You can install ProxMate searching it through the add-on panel you find in Firefox or you can decide to directly open the link from the  ProxMate website. After the installation ( no restart required) you have to find the “shark fin” icon into your Firefox bar. If you don’t find it immediately, you have to manage your icons and manually personalize the bar.

Then, click on ProxMate “my button” icon and select: “Install New Packages”. You are redirect to the ProxMate website where you can select Pandora or others interesting websites (e.g. Netflix, iHeart Radio, etc..) with specific IP restriction policies. 

Now, you select your desired website/service and follow the instructions (click selection) that will appear on the screen to complete the installation.

Last but not least, don’t forget to click again on the ProxMate icon and enable the proxy service.

As usual, I recommend to NOT forget to disable  ProxMate (as every other proxy server) when you don’t need to use it.

Oops, I forgot to say that ProxMate is free of charge……. Enjoy it!!

——————

References:

https://addons.mozilla.org/it/firefox/addon/proxmate/?src=search

https://proxmate.me/

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Shape of the Web by Mozilla

“Shape of the Web shows you where the Web stands today, the issues that impact it and what you can do to get involved.”