cross-posted from: https://feddit.org/post/8724158

An alternative to a VPNs - afair it routes your traffic through a Tor-style network, it's FOSS software made in Austria

We're very happy to share Techlore's video review of the BusKill Kill Cord.

Can't see video above? Watch it on PeerTube at neat.tube or on YouTube at youtu.be/Zns0xObbOPM

Disclaimer: We gave Techlore a free BusKill Kit for review; we did not pay them nor restrict their impartiality and freedom to publish an independent review. For more information, please see Techlore's Review Unit Protocols policy. We did require them to make the video open-source as a condition of receiving this free review unit. The above video is licensed CC BY-SA; you are free to redistribute it. If you are a video producer and would like a free BusKill Kit for review, please contact us

To see the full discussion about this video on the Techolore forums, see:

• discuss.techlore.tech/t/buskill-secure-your-laptop-in-seconds

Support BusKill

We're looking forward to continuing to improve the BusKill software and looking for other avenues to distribute our hardware BusKill cable to make it more accessible this year.

If you want to help, please consider purchasing a BusKill cable for yourself or a loved one. It helps us fund further development, and you get your own BusKill cable to keep you or your loved ones safe.

Buy a BusKill Cable
https://buskill.in/buy

You can also buy a BusKill cable with bitcoin, monero, and other altcoins from our BusKill Store's .onion site.

Stay safe,
The BusKill Team
https://www.buskill.in/
http://www.buskillvampfih2iucxhit3qp36i2zzql3u6pmkeafvlxs3tlmot5yad.onion/

cross-posted from: https://scribe.disroot.org/post/2088202

Archived

[...]

For their own people [the Chinese Communist Party, CCP, has] imposed a dystopia, including the “great firewall” to control information from the outside. It also exerts strict control over domestic Internet information, uses a vast surveillance camera network with facial recognition and monitors financial transactions done online. If the CCP can think of any way to impose more control over their subjects they will do it.

Abroad they traditionally used RICE (Reward, Ideology, Coercion and Ego) techniques to not only recruit spies, they have used it to win over politicians, scientists and other useful people. They have weaponized overseas Chinese community groups, taken over their media and even set up police stations around the world.

Through software like ByteDance’s TikTok they are capable of sweeping data collection, while Chinese hackers steal all sorts of information and attack online systems. Huawei used their telecommunications equipment to collect yet more.

They have worked to subvert algorithms even in foreign Web sites by flooding the Internet with disinformation and misinformation. Their infamous “little pink” and “50-cent” armies roam the Internet spreading their agenda.

MAKING PROPAGANDA

AI is taking this to an exponentially higher level.

The CCP is investing heavily in AI because it opens opportunities for the CCP’s United Front Work Department (UFWD) and Ministry of State Security (MSS) to vastly increase its power worldwide.

While Hailuo [a very popular AI used to create videos which is based in Shanghai] can be very useful in creating propaganda, TikTok owner ByteDance’s just released OmniHuman-1, which is explicitly for deepfakes and is shockingly good. It is able to produce videos from pictures, video and audio fed by the user to create videos realistic enough to require paying attention.

[...]

The gullible will fall for outrageous deepfakes in partisan social media, but these are pretty easy to discredit. It is the more subtle videos that are concerning because they can be used subtly to change the narrative, such as editing a video of the US Secretary of State and swap out “one China policy” for “one China principle.”

[...]

The release last month of DeepSeek-R1 AI by Hangzhou-based High Flyer rightly attracted a vast amount of attention. Users amused themselves trying to get around the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) imposed censorship, but more alarmingly hackers discovered unprotected data ports [in Deepseek], that data was being shared with TikTok and many reminded us that by law they must share any data with the CCP.

[...]

Perhaps intentionally to avoid widespread press scrutiny, the most powerful AI agent ever, UI-TARS, was released during the DeepSeek hoopla. AI agents by American companies require a paid subscription but offer powerful research capabilities and other functions by taking over a browser and doing work for you.

Unlike previous AI agents, UI-TARS comes in two varieties, one taking over the browser like the others, but with a second option to take over the entire computer or phone.

It can install software, scrape any bit of data it likes and make all sorts of modifications all on its own following whatever instructions it is given whether online or not. That could completely change how we work, play and communicate on our devices.

UI-TARS is open source, so unlike the American AI agents, developers can access, modify and distribute the software for free. This should encourage widespread adoption, including under different branding as long as they retain the original copyright notice, license text and notices in the source code, which non-coders never read.

Why would they do this for free instead of requiring a subscription? To make sure it gets on to as many devices as possible.

How nice of ByteDance, the developer of UI-TARS.

[...]

Soon people will be downloading off-brand UI-TARS without knowing it, and there could be hundreds or even thousands of brands running it. Your [...] AI agent running on UI-TARS can act as spyware tracking your every move and stealing all your data for Beijing, and it will know everything about you — opening up blackmail opportunities on a massive scale.

[...]

As is the case on TikTok, results playing up the CCP line would also be prioritized and content scrubbed from the results as DeepSeek-R1 AI does now, albeit still rather clumsily. DeepSeek-generated articles and books, propaganda videos made with Hailuo AI and deepfake videos made or modified by OmniHuman would feature prominently.

Millions of people around the world could soon be constantly surveiled through their own cameras and microphones, monitored and tracked and living in an alternate information reality — just like in China.

The CCP would have the ability to control nearly every aspect of these people’s lives — just like in China.

But unlike the Chinese, they would not even know how much power they have lost to the CCP.

cross-posted from: https://feddit.nl/post/29675306

I am not the author.

I found this blog to have both a short summary of the reasons as well as a pretty complete overview of the options for protecting against this specific threat model. I can just send this to people and they'll understand the why and the how.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/26673961

Had never heard of this before today. Anyone tried it?

EDIT: "Being a fork of Mozilla Thunderbird, the software collects some data about the user, less than the original Mozilla Thunderbird, as outlined in Thunderbird's privacy statement. No data is submitted to Betterbird, some data may be submitted to Mozilla. No telemetry and no crash reports are submitted, however, add-on updates and blocklists are downloaded from Mozilla sites. Betterbird offers a product Start Page which processes access data as described above."

cross-posted from: https://mastodon.neat.computer/users/privacyguides/statuses/114094235648766052

Tor is an invaluable tool for bypassing censorship and browsing privately, in this week's video we dive into the details and explain how it works. Plus we cover some things you should avoid when using Tor to make sure you maintain your anonymity.

https://www.privacyguides.org/videos/2025/03/02/why-you-need-tor/

▶️ Watch on YouTube or PeerTube

#Tor #Privacy #TorBrowser #PrivacyGuides #Video #Security #Anonymity

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/26244492

The answer to "what is Firefox?" on Mozilla's FAQ page about its browser used to read:

The Firefox Browser is the only major browser backed by a not-for-profit that doesn’t sell your personal data to advertisers while helping you protect your personal information.

Now it just says:

The Firefox Browser, the only major browser backed by a not-for-profit, helps you protect your personal information.

In other words, Mozilla is no longer willing to commit to not selling your personal data to advertisers.

A related change was also highlighted by mozilla.org commenter jkaelin, who linked direct to the source code for that FAQ page. To answer the question, "is Firefox free?" Moz used to say:

Yep! The Firefox Browser is free. Super free, actually. No hidden costs or anything. You don’t pay anything to use it, and we don’t sell your personal data.

Now it simply reads:

Yep! The Firefox Browser is free. Super free, actually. No hidden costs or anything. You don’t pay anything to use it.

Again, a pledge to not sell people's data has disappeared. Varma insisted this is the result of the fluid definition of “sell” in the context of data sharing and privacy.

So, I use addy.io, and I'm slowly trying to de-google my life, but I ran into a service last night that rejected my email alias: Steam. So as of now, it's still stuck on Google.

I'm also using Tuta, but I'd like to avoid handing that address out to any online services if possible. What's the best option here?

Here's some ideas I had:

• Keep using that old Google address but filter specific senders and forward them to the alias I want to use.
• Set up a new email on Proton or Mailbox.org and use that to forward to my chosen aliases.

Is there perhaps a better or different way to have aliases for services that reject them?

Cross-posted from "Is running Librewolf without disabling fingerprinting worth it?" by @Yingwu@lemmy.dbzer0.com in !firefox@fedia.io

Without disabling fingerprinting, zoom options aren't saved, dark mode doesn't really work and Netflix is blocked. But is it even worth running Librewolf if you enable fingerprinting? Isn't that one of the main reasons why one runs Librewolf?

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/26233189

"Android System SafetyCore’ claims to be a ‘security’ application, but whilst running in the background, it collects call logs, contacts, location, your microphone, and much more making this application ‘spyware’ and a HUGE privacy concern. It is strongly advised to uninstall this program if you can. To do this, navigate to 'Settings’ > 'Apps’, then delete the application."

If you don't want to navigate android settings you can also simply uninstall it from the Play Store https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.google.android.safetycore

Additionaly you can install this placeholder app to prevent Google from reinstalling it every time it updates: https://github.com/daboynb/SafetyCore-placeholder

Edit: https://privacytests.org/

cross-posted from: https://theprancingpony.in/objects/883cc655-8267-c309-1237-9eb599273886

Like many others, I’ve been looking into internet browsers lately. This guy has put together a pretty extensive comparison: pctips.com/best-browsers

#privacy #browsers #firefox #firefoxgate

TL;DR:

• "all rights" has been replaced with "rights necessary"
• Overall language of "operate Firefox" still remains, with a link to their Privacy Notice.
• "nonexclusive, royalty-free, worldwide license" remains, but is explicitly limited to "the purpose of doing as you request with the content you input in Firefox"
• Removed references to their Acceptable Use Policy

Details from a developer and FOSS advocate POV:

This is not enough.

Mozilla has yet to comment on why this change was necessary, outside of some vague "legally we have to" language. While these updated Terms shift more control back to the user, it's simply not enough. The only reason Mozilla would need any sort of license from the user is if they are going to be doing something with it on their systems. Any local use is and continues to be fully covered by the Mozilla Public License, which is the current license used by Firefox.

The MPL includes an indemnity and liability clause, which protects Mozilla from anything you might do with their browser. I can't think of a single FOSS license that doesn't include these clauses.

Controlling an application within the confines of your local device does not require the application to have a license to your content. It is, from a legal perspective, a tool you are using to do your own stuff. We don't give chisels manufactures a license for statues we make, notebook companies licenses for stories we write. And on the other side of that coin, no one sues Mozilla or Google because someone accesses The Pirate Bay or fmovies using the browser.

But let's take Mozilla at their word for a second. Suppose there was a legal reason for licensing your data.

Does Mozilla intend to force the websites you visit to agree to their terms? There are two sides to the connection you make on a website. For the sake of argument, say I'm visiting Disney+, another company super picky about their copyrights. I enter "www.disneyplus.com" into my browser, agreeing to Mozilla license provision. In order to "operate Firefox", the license allows Firefox to go to Disney+, who then responds back with their catalog. If Mozilla needs a license from me for my data, surely they need a license from Disney for their data to "operate Firefox".

In what world do you think Disney is going to grant Mozilla a "nonexclusive, royalty-free, worldwide license"? Their argument for any sort of licensing being necessary falls flat with this example right here.

Quick Edit here: their TOU assumes that you are the only license holder of content you upload using the browser. You cannot grant licenses to other people's content. So, in essence, you cannot upload a picture taken by your friend and if you do, the nature of these Terms allows your friend to sue Mozilla for copyright infringement. The very nature of asking for this license exposes them to liability for violations against copyright. Most websites have a clause that says something along the lines of "you agree that you have permission to share the content you upload to our servers and grant us a license to use that content as if it were you own" etc.

This isn't about your data within the local browser. This is about your data flowing through Mozilla. That's why they need the license. Their additional clause "This does not give Mozilla any ownership in that content" does absolutely nothing. A license, by it's nature, means that Mozilla doesn't own the content and seeks your permission to use it.

To Mozilla's credit, they removed references to their Acceptable Use Policy, but remains in place their ability to terminate your license to use Firefox for any reason, keeping Firefox firmly in the "Source Available" category.

Each person will need to decide whether Firefox fits in within their personal use of the internet. I, for one, am tired of my content being used without my express permission. My goal is to move to Waterfox by the end of March, if not sooner.