Why the noise for Chromium and not Iron?

[defcon3]

Hello folks,

I recently came across the Iron Browser and was astonished to find out that Google Chromium is tracking so much and collecting information about so many user-side events...

Check out the project site here: http://www.srware.net/en/software_srware_iron_chrome_vs_iron.php and tell me how is it possible there is no PPA for Iron but one for Chromium? :)

Do you like to be tracked like a number? ;)

[bionicbellend]

what does it track?

[Closed_Port]

... tell me how is it possible there is no PPA for Iron but one for Chromium? :)

Let me guess: Because there is no linux port of Iron yet?

[defcon3]

Wouldn't hurt if any of you actually read the link before commenting, would it?

1) Apparently each Chrome browser has a way to be identified, i.e. the user behind it may be assigned a "profile" of behavior - targeted advertising

2) the Iron source code is available just like the Chromium is - question was why do you think it gets no attention for its own PPA?

cheers

[Closed_Port]

2) the Iron source code is available just like the Chromium is - question was why do you think it gets no attention for its own PPA?

For crying out loud: It is the source code for the windows version. It probably would not even compile on linux much less produce anything the would be able to run on linux!

[.Maleficus.]

Wouldn't hurt if any of you actually read the link before commenting, would it?

1) Apparently each Chrome browser has a way to be identified, i.e. the user behind it may be assigned a "profile" of behavior - targeted advertising

2) the Iron source code is available just like the Chromium is - question was why do you think it gets no attention for its own PPA?

cheers
Probably because it doesn't run on Linux yet.

Here's a Linux Magazine article you might want to read.

http://www.linux-magazine.com/Online/News/Browser-Clone-Iron-Instead-of-Chrome

[defcon3]

Thank you for the link - apparently we'll have to wait for the linux port, huh... :)

[Closed_Port]

1) Apparently each Chrome browser has a way to be identified, i.e. the user behind it may be assigned a "profile" of behavior - targeted advertising

Also, these issues have been discussed at great length already. For google's take on it see for example here:
http://www.google.com/support/chrome/bin/answer.py?answer=107684

Whether you find these answers good enough or not is of course for you to decide, but please stop acting as if there is some evil conspiracy that you just uncovered.

Google is after all pretty open about what it does and most importantly, it released the code and so made a project like Iron possible.

[Closed_Port]

Thank you for the link - apparently we'll have to wait for the linux port, huh... :)
Now really Mister "Wouldn't hurt if any of you actually read the link before commenting, would it?" ...

[defcon3]

You are absolutely right. I apologize for the quicker-than-thought fingers on the keyboard :lolflag:

[Quake]

Get this repository if you want to test the Linux version of Chromium in Ubuntu : https://launchpad.net/~chromium-daily/+archive/ppa

[banjobacon]

Bumping this thread to point out that an alpha release of SRWare Iron is available for Linux: http://www.srware.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=561

I have not tried it out yet, but I figured it may be of interest to others.

[mrgnash]

Hello folks,

I recently came across the Iron Browser and was astonished to find out that Google Chromium is tracking so much and collecting information about so many user-side events...

Check out the project site here: http://www.srware.net/en/software_srware_iron_chrome_vs_iron.php and tell me how is it possible there is no PPA for Iron but one for Chromium? :)

Do you like to be tracked like a number? ;)

Couldn't care less, frankly.

[ad_267]

So what does this provide that chromium doesn't? The website goes on about how it's better than Chrome because it doesn't send data to Google, but doesn't say why anyone would want it instead of Chromium.

[Ric_NYC]

I had enough with "forks".

[HappinessNow]

Let me guess: Because there is no linux port of Iron yet?

Iron for Linux: Infos and Download >here (http://www.srware.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=561)<


Bumping this thread to point out that an alpha release of SRWare Iron is available for Linux: http://www.srware.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=561

I have not tried it out yet, but I figured it may be of interest to others.

What you said.


I had enough with "forks".

How about spoons?

I just installed Iron on XP, trying to figure how to get Adblock to work may make me lose interest fast. Interesting thing is Iron comes pre-installed with "Partner" ads:


http://ubuntuforums.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=126549&d=1251449072Reminds me of the old, old Opera that came pre-bundled with Partner ads (They were wise enough to eliminate that years ago)

Strange thing is I never minded Google Tracking practices in gmail (or in Google Search) why would I begin to worry about it in Google Chrome/Chromium, and if you can get Adblock to work does it really matter?

[t0p]

So what does this provide that chromium doesn't? The website goes on about how it's better than Chrome because it doesn't send data to Google, but doesn't say why anyone would want it instead of Chromium.

Don't you think the fact that Iron doesn't spy on your online activities and inform Google might be a feature that users might want? Some people actually value their privacy and dislike Google's scrutiny. Like me for instance: I like Google's search engine but resent that Google logs my searches. So I use Scroogle (https://ssl.scroogle.org/). I like Firefox, so it's unlikely I'll use Chromium. But if I decided to switch browsers, Iron's (alleged) respect for my privacy would make it a more likely replacement than Chromium.

[banjobacon]

Strange thing is I never minded Google Tracking practices in gmail (or in Google Search) why would I begin to worry about it in Google Chrome/Chromium, and if you can get Adblock to work does it really matter?

I'm not completely against Google tracking my habits on its own websites, but why would I want Google tracking every URL I type into my browser? I'd rather Google not track my non-Google internet activities. Also, given the options of two nearly identical browsers, one of which allows Google to collect nearly all your internet activities, one of which does not, I'd rather choose the latter.

The main feature Iron adds to Chrome is a built-in adblocker. Unfortunately, it doesn't yet work in Linux.

[MasterNetra]

Windows 7 (RC at least) doesn't seem to let you set Iron as a default browser 0.o

[misfitpierce]

But they are comparing that to Google Chrome which is at 3.0 version, chromium is 4.0 something, do you have what 4.0 is running in chromium before comparing for linux users?

[Paqman]

what does it track?

Nothing of any importance, unless you're uberparanoid. There's a counter used to count the number of installs, and an opt-in unique identifier.

From a dev on the wiki on Chromium's site (http://code.google.com/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=1813):

There's a little confusion here that I'd like to clear up. There are two IDs being
discussed. They are stored and used separately.

First of all, there is an installation ID (iid) which is created at install time to
de-dup install counts. This is necessary to accurately count the number of successful
installations that have occurred. The iid is generated randomly (not based on any
other information) and is deleted in the next update check after first run.

There is a second ID called the clientID which is used for the user metrics service.
This is an opt-in service that lets users send usage statistics to Google so that we
can learn how the product is being used for the sake of making improvements. It helps
us answer questions like, "Are people using the back button?" and "How common is it
that people click the back button repeatedly?" Users can always update their
preference about sending usage statistics on the "Under the Hood" tab of options.

[MasterNetra]

Actually nevermind I forgot to run Iron as Admin first before setting it as default.

[ad_267]

Don't you think the fact that Iron doesn't spy on your online activities and inform Google might be a feature that users might want? Some people actually value their privacy and dislike Google's scrutiny. Like me for instance: I like Google's search engine but resent that Google logs my searches. So I use Scroogle (https://ssl.scroogle.org/). I like Firefox, so it's unlikely I'll use Chromium. But if I decided to switch browsers, Iron's (alleged) respect for my privacy would make it a more likely replacement than Chromium.

Ok I just assumed that Chrome sends data to Google, but Chromium doesn't.

[Chlorhydrikk]

Iron has evoluted a lot since. We maybe should start thinking about replacing Chromium with it and support its development ;)

[Mr. Picklesworth]

what does it track?

Here you go:
http://www.google.com/support/chrome/bin/answer.py?answer=114836&hl=en

(From Tools›Options›Under the hood›Privacy in Chromium)

And for what it's worth, no, I don't care. I for one am happy leaving all those on, content in the knowledge that nothing particularly extraordinary is happening; my computer casts as unique a fingerprint as ever (https://panopticlick.eff.org/). Nice that they document it, though.

As far as I can tell, Iron could pretty happily be reduced to a how-to document that shows how to disable all of Chromium's features that dare access the Internet to do their job. Heck, it would probably work better that way.

[swoll1980]

Do you like to be tracked like a number? ;)

Doesn't bother me in the least. Why should it?

[jrusso2]

Why do people who care so much about google tracking them online care nothing about their cell phone tracking them in real life?

[swoll1980]

Why do people who care so much about google tracking them online care nothing about their cell phone tracking them in real life?

Guilty consciouses?

[Irihapeti]

I get amused by the folks who make a big fuss about being tracked, and then want to find out who it was that hacked them.

[Chlorhydrikk]

Well, I guess that Iron is more "Ubuntistic" than Chrome & Chromium. Why should we help Google? And accept to be tracked by them?
We're in the free and open source world, so such softwares shouldn't be supported by our community!

PS: that, of course, is my own opinion...

[Paqman]

Why do people who care so much about google tracking them online care nothing about their cell phone tracking them in real life?

Standard-issue paranoia, with just a dash of misinformation for good luck.

[Chrysantine]

Bottom line:
Chromium doesn't track jack.
Chrome uses a RLZ tag when using the integrated search.

[Ylon]

Iron is a good idea... sadly it's developer are more windows centric.
Beta for Windows is 5, beta for Linux is 4.


Firefox is 3,6 for Windows... Linux and whatever. They play fairer (even Opera did disappointed me: ex opera user from Opera 5.12)

[98cwitr]

i use chrome on every machine i've got...so what if they track the sites you go to? Big woop.

[Paqman]

i use chrome on every machine i've got...so what if they track the sites you go to? Big woop.

They don't even do that.

[NCLI]

Wouldn't hurt if any of you actually read the link before commenting, would it?

1) Apparently each Chrome browser has a way to be identified, i.e. the user behind it may be assigned a "profile" of behavior - targeted advertising

And what exactly is bad about that? It means that you receive less ads you don't care about, that should be a good thing.

[98cwitr]

They don't even do that.

uh...yeah they do http://www.google.com/chrome/intl/en/privacy.html

I like their collections because it makes browsing more usable for me...it increases my efficiency on the web :) And most of these collections can be toggled on or off in the Options menu

[Lightstar]

I'll only trust reviews from third party.
Of course the Iron browser guys will bash chromium, and vice versa.

[Paqman]

uh...yeah they do http://www.google.com/chrome/intl/en/privacy.html


That link backs me up. They can be sent stuff that you type into the address bar, and a couple of other extraordinary cases, but they aren't tracking your whole browsing session.

[mister_playboy]

I had been tracking Iron development pretty closely, but I lost interest since the Linux version doesn't support ad blocking and that was the feature I was most interested in. #-o

The source code has always been hosted on Rapidshare, and the devs were unresponsive to requests to host it elsewhere during the time RS was only allowing free downloads for something like half the day. :rolleyes: That RS policy seems to have changed since then, but it still makes sense to mirror it on at least one other hoster like Megaupload.

[BOBSta]

BUMP!

Just to keep this thread fresh - why not check out the new SRWare Iron BETA v5.0.377?

It's based on Chromium 5 and the latest Webkit and supports ad-Blocking and User switching as well as some Chrome plug-ins.

I've been running the Windows BETA for a couple of weeks and find it much smoother, faster, and more responsive than v4. I haven't tried it on Ubuntu yet, but will do soon (I only spotted the update today). I've pretty much completely migrated over to it from Firefox as I find it renders a lot of sites much better than Firefox*

Details at: http://www.srware.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=1502

Download 32-bit here: http://www.srware.net/downloads/iron-linux.tar.gz

Download 64-bit here: http://www.srware.net/downloads/iron-linux-64.tar.gz

And don't forget your adBlocking list from fanBoy's blog, here: http://www.fanboy.co.nz/adblock/iron/

Some reports of it working ok on 10.04, but not 9.10 or latest Debian. I would like to have the option of installing in Ubuntu from the Software Center...

Bob :)

* I am not affiliated with SRWare in any way. I just want a fast, secure browser which renders the web correctly.

[madnessjack]

No one picked up on this yet? http://neugierig.org/software/chromium/notes/2009/12/iron.html

Don't understand why people so scared of Google would trust this guy. Seems a bit messed up.

[uRock]

Why do people who care so much about google tracking them online care nothing about their cell phone tracking them in real life?

I agree with you on that. I would like to find a way to detect whether or not my LoJack is calling home. Everyone trusts it to retrieve their stolen car, including me, but how easily is it used wrongly?

[James7]

No one picked up on this yet? http://neugierig.org/software/chromium/notes/2009/12/iron.html

Don't understand why people so scared of Google would trust this guy. Seems a bit messed up.

Wow! I love how this guy hates Google but wants to drive people to his website so he can get Google Adsense cash! lol

[Mr. Picklesworth]

By the way, Google has open sourced the library that generated those “tracking codes” some people were concerned about.
http://google-opensource.blogspot.com/2010/06/google-chromes-rlz-library-is-now-open.html

[LowSky]

Why is everyone worried about Google tracking? Any company website you visit can log your MAC address.