I'm going to give a summary about reducing and preventing web trackers. As defined by Wikipedia, a web tracker "refers to the act of archiving existing websites and tracking changes to the website over time". In the old days, tracking cookies were used. But with the use of "blocking third party cookies", it evolved into other forums to monitor tracking behavior such as single pixel entities with code placed in them, as well as other techniques. Your IP can get logged by the code of these third parties, mainly for the purpose of advertising based on your browsing habits and interests. Your privacy is the cost you pay for browsing through websites. Without web trackers and advertisements, many websites would not be able to pay the bills unless they are a legitimate business. I am a user of Firefox, which is made by Mozilla. Mozilla was recognized in 2013 as the Most Trusted Internet Company for Privacy. The nice thing about Firefox is you have thousands of add-ons available if you would like to add some additional functionality. Chrome also offers the same, even though it may not be as extensive as Firefox. Two of my favorite add-ons are Adblock-Plus and Ghostery. They are also available on the Firefox add-ons pages here and here. With Edward Snowden informing the world of the NSA around May, 2013, people started to adopt methods to reduce and prevent themselves from being tracked. About 2/3 of Internet users do not want to be tracked, with about 20% wanting to be tracked because they believe it gives them better results. When it comes to Google, they track your browsing habits, too. Most of their revenue is from advertisements alone. I switched from using Google to DuckDuckGo recently simply because it doesn't track browsing habits and the results it gives are pretty good. With Adblock-Plus installed, you will hardly notice any advertisements. It also cuts down on your bandwidth slightly, I recall reading somewhere. And Ghostery blocks about 80% of the trackers out there. It isn't perfect, but its a good start for the average user. For more advanced users, be sure to check out this link to learn more: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-mStT_mIi6Y There are far more tech-savvy people here than myself, so if you fall into that category and would like to add more to this discussion, please feel free to give your own suggestions on how people can protect their privacy when it comes to browsing the Internet. I hope you all find this topic helpful.
The point is (it is actually a shame) that one needs to learn about this before one can apply the measures at all. Example smart phones (Android). Android is propagated to be safe even because one does not have root access per default. BUT it comes pre-configured to realize interests of Google, which are only to a limited extent the interests of the end user. The app ad-away had to be removed from Google's app store. That is not the problem, one can get it somewhere. The problem is one needs root access for the app in order to apply its function (to block ads / redirects to add sites and so on). The manufacturers are threatening with losing warranty when rooted and to root the phone is not made for everybody for several reasons...it can boot loop or 'soft-brick' what makes people to stay away... On desktop windows one has the rights to install other browsers with add blocking functions without the risk to lose warranty or to boot loop the PC. In this regard windows is actually more end user friendly than Android. Either way one needs to make own efforts and it is quite understandable that a lack of interest of PC stuff is responsible that companies like Google and M$ can realize what they want. But nobody can demand that ALL people should get interest in something they actually don't like, to deal with PC stuff. Furthermore I am happy that people are interested in such topics and are contributing at forums like MDL to inform people what is possible. Thanks @OP for your thread.
I've found out that although Ghostery is easy to use and set up, it isn't as good as another alternative add-on. Ivan, the author of QuidsUp, did another review on an add-on called Policeman. If you don't mind a bit of work in customizing the add-on, I suggest going along with what Ivan said by getting rid of Ghostery in your Firefox to replace it with Policeman instead. You can get the Policeman add-on at the following link: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/policeman/ Safe surfing!
i actually detest firefox.. i remember that i had a 2-core machine that switched itself off, whenever it reached a core temp of near 100`C bad bad memories.. screaming cooling fans.. firefox managed that [switch off] in five minutes flat. i deleted it. i have never looked over my shoulder. i never will. it is a total nono for me. i use opera now. in my opinion nobody needs a browser that does that. even if it has a thousand plug-ins to raise your cpu temps. just totally useless, imo. even if i have got a bomb-proof desktop now, with 4 cores that never go much over ~50`c..firefox is a nightmare for me.. no-one wants such a footprint. just my two cents. but i will not try to start a browser row. i like opera, safari, dillo, no chrome for me, no google too, duckduckgo is a better search engine, privacy-wise.. but what i like in this thread is the notion that we are being tracked. no 1000 plug-ins will ever protect you from that. the www turned into that. unfortunately. and we are just fools to use adobe stuff, of course, with their sol cookies, or buy sony stuff.. malware incorporated.. what i mean to say, longwindedly, is that we do it ourselves,or some of it.. by using such garbage at all.. for now, i just run ccleaner after every single browser session, and i delete all i find there..and it pays to look at alternatives..
just a n00b tip : if u r using nightly, go to about:config > search browser.polaris.enabled and set its value to true restart ur browser and see the change in preferences> privacy: bad luck, i had more tips to share may be sumtym later chrome users can start by using firefox or any of its variant