TSNBDSC Posted July 11, 2010 Share Posted July 11, 2010 ... have the usual suspects (Adblock Plus, etc.) but I may be missing some ! ... seems Spybot doesn't work with FF ... found a whole bunch of cookies when I need maintainence today even though I use private browsing ... thanks to all ... tom Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WVUFootball29 Posted July 11, 2010 Share Posted July 11, 2010 web of trust is a good one to keep you from hitting sites that arent legit Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dan Posted July 11, 2010 Share Posted July 11, 2010 web of trust is a good one to keep you from hitting sites that arent legit Yep, thanks to Dean, I install WOT with all firefox installations. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chilly Posted July 11, 2010 Share Posted July 11, 2010 The best add-on isn't something you can install in your browser, but your own common sense. WOT is a flawed add-on. It's based upon community reviews, asking people to rate websites. This might work great at first, but as those types of things get more users and more mainstream, the quality of information you receive from it declines. There's also things like "NoSript" and "Flashblock" which blocks pretty much any Javascript, Java, or Flash element. Sure, it blocks malicious stuff, but it blocks all stuff - quite the sledgehammer for a tiny nail. IMO, here's the importance of security: 1.) User behavior/knowledge 2.) Browser Design 3.) Everything else The most important thing is for the user to know what's legitimate and what's not. No amount of add-ons, fancy technology, or anything else is going to protect a dumb user, while it will generally get in the way and cause false positives. Next is browser design and architecture (which is where IE failed so hard). If you really want to be secure, switch from Mozilla Firefox to Google Chrome. AFAIK, Chrome is the only one of the main browsers that's setup to run from a true sandbox by default. Currently, Sandboxing isn't even available in Firefox outside of running some add-ons in an add-ons only sandbox. IE7 & IE8 runs in "protected mode" which doesn't allow write access to files, but still allows read access (unlike Chrome's setup). It also only works in Vista or later, whereas Chrome's even works in XP. Here's an article from when Google Chrome for Windows launched about this security model, if you're interested: http://blog.chromium.org/2008/10/new-appro...ity-google.html If the browser is engineered correctly, and the user has common sense, you shouldn't have to worry about security add-ons. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EC-Bills Posted July 12, 2010 Share Posted July 12, 2010 The best add-on isn't something you can install in your browser, but your own common sense. WOT is a flawed add-on. It's based upon community reviews, asking people to rate websites. This might work great at first, but as those types of things get more users and more mainstream, the quality of information you receive from it declines. There's also things like "NoSript" and "Flashblock" which blocks pretty much any Javascript, Java, or Flash element. Sure, it blocks malicious stuff, but it blocks all stuff - quite the sledgehammer for a tiny nail. IMO, here's the importance of security: 1.) User behavior/knowledge 2.) Browser Design 3.) Everything else The most important thing is for the user to know what's legitimate and what's not. No amount of add-ons, fancy technology, or anything else is going to protect a dumb user, while it will generally get in the way and cause false positives. Next is browser design and architecture (which is where IE failed so hard). If you really want to be secure, switch from Mozilla Firefox to Google Chrome. AFAIK, Chrome is the only one of the main browsers that's setup to run from a true sandbox by default. Currently, Sandboxing isn't even available in Firefox outside of running some add-ons in an add-ons only sandbox. IE7 & IE8 runs in "protected mode" which doesn't allow write access to files, but still allows read access (unlike Chrome's setup). It also only works in Vista or later, whereas Chrome's even works in XP. Here's an article from when Google Chrome for Windows launched about this security model, if you're interested: http://blog.chromium.org/2008/10/new-appro...ity-google.html If the browser is engineered correctly, and the user has common sense, you shouldn't have to worry about security add-ons. Well said and Chrome rocks! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stuckincincy Posted July 12, 2010 Share Posted July 12, 2010 ... have the usual suspects (Adblock Plus, etc.) but I may be missing some ! ... seems Spybot doesn't work with FF ... found a whole bunch of cookies when I need maintainence today even though I use private browsing ... thanks to all ... tom The add-on Better Privacy is useful... I have a skepticism about Chrome. Google sure likes to grab and sell information - I wonder if their browser enhances that. Search Google +investigations. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chilly Posted July 12, 2010 Share Posted July 12, 2010 The add-on Better Privacy is useful... I have a skepticism about Chrome. Google sure likes to grab and sell information - I wonder if their browser enhances that. Search Google +investigations. It's open source. You can go look at the code yourself. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Chrome#Usage_tracking That's what Google does. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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