Privacy Guard: Your Privacy Matters – Vivaldi Browser snapshot 3319.12

mib2berlin

@AAAi
Hrm, you need a vivaldi.net account to post here, this is they same as a sync account, if you use it or not.
To post here you give up privacy but not to get more privacy?

DoctorG

@AAAi You are using a Vivaldi account at forum and other Vivaldi community places.
If you are concerned about privacy, do not login to Vivaldi account and read only in forum.

But i understand that you do not want to tunnel your data thru a US company "VPN" proxy.

iAN CooG

If one questions even if Vivaldi is trustworthy, he better go back under his rock and don't connect to internet at all.

DoctorG

@iAN-CooG No, i think user is concerned about US proxy and worst US privacy laws.

mossman

I'm not really one of those who believes using a "VPN" proxy system is the panacea they think it is, but I'll give this a go to help Vivaldi get feedback. If it convinces some of the tinfoil hat brigade that Vivaldi is worth it then why not?

DoctorG

@mossman I guess it is because MoziFoxi has such "VPN", too.

AAAi

@mib2berlin: It may be the same account, but it works different.
I can login onto the forum without having vivaldi/browser sync connected (with all that is entails)

I would not be able to use the privacy guard without having to vivaldi/browser sync connected

luetage

@Pathduck See the blog post by Invisv ☛ https://invisv.com/articles/vivaldi-privacy-guard.html
The current feature is a free trial period of one month, then they obviously need to request payment from their users. I assume Vivaldi will get a share of it, which is a great addition to the current system of bookmark‐ and search engine partnerships.

AltCode

@Pathduck said in Privacy Guard: Your Privacy Matters – Vivaldi Browser snapshot 3319.12:

... but not sure how many would be willing to pay for a "quasi" VPN that won't allow you to choose your location...

I don't know, I think there could be plenty of people that'd be interested in this. Just look at Apple's iCloud Private Relay; per Invisv's article, it too is a MPR service, and that's gotten its fair share of usage (for anyone that is on iOS/macOS, has an iCloud+ subscription, and also uses Safari at least).

The main takeaway from this, and Vivaldi should be crystal clear about this if they do continue offering this, is that its main purpose is not for masking your location to another specific location. It is instead for masking your IP (which incidentally also happens to mask your location).

mossman

@AltCode said in Privacy Guard: Your Privacy Matters – Vivaldi Browser snapshot 3319.12:

The main takeaway from this, and Vivaldi should be crystal clear about this if they do continue offering this, is that its main purpose is not for masking your location to another specific location. It is instead for masking your IP (which incidentally also happens to mask your location).

To be honest, the whole "VPN is to hide your location" thing is a bit weird - that's a possible side-effect(*) rather than the actual purpose.

(*) Edit: a side-effect which can be exploited, of course, but a side-effect nonetheless.

mib2berlin

@AAAi
You are correct, you have to login to the Vivaldi sync server.
I have tested this, I sync "Nothing" to the Vivaldi servers and can use the Privacy Guard/VPN.

I guess the Vivaldi team will offer a login to the Privacy Guard without using the sync servers.
You have to trust a company to use there software anyway, all Windows user have to trust Microsoft.
I use Linux and I trust the Vivaldi team, some of them are in the browser business for 30 Years, me too.

Cheers, mib

DoctorG

For users and their trust in companies it could be better if VPN relay would be on Vivaldi servers at Island.
But that is a matter of cost (ok, i think users are willing to pay) and as users are from different countries a server over the world are needed as routing all to Island is not applicable.

Oh, look Ma! They do datatransfer to other countries. NOPE!
https://invisv.com/privacy#:~:text=Jurisdiction and CROSS-BORDER TRANSFER

GRMMPFFF!

If you are located in the EU/EEA and you have concerns regarding the processing of your Personal Information, you may also lodge a complaint with an EU/EEA supervisory authority.

Look Ma! They joke on us!
https://invisv.com/privacy#:~:text=on the Services.-,CONTACTING US,-INVISV%2C INC.%2C located

No Ma!, i do not join this strange club of VPNners.

daniel

@derDay So, you like the feature I spent 70 minutes on but not the one the team spent months on?

derDay

@daniel
uhm, yes

(RSS fan)

Chas4

23rd updated

funkytoad

I can't connect to any website with privacy guard enabled.

Pathduck

@funkytoad And what's the error message you get?

Are you able to connect to the relay directly? Try using telnet or netcat from a command line.

$ nc -v fastest.vivaldi.stations.invisv.com 443
Connection to fastest.vivaldi.stations.invisv.com (136.144.49.43) 443 port [tcp/https] succeeded!

$ telnet fastest.vivaldi.stations.invisv.com 443
Trying 136.144.49.43...
Connected to fastest.vivaldi.stations.invisv.com.
Escape character is '^]'.
Connection closed by foreign host.

funkytoad

@Pathduck It doesn't seem to actually connect. It says connected, but remains "Fetching" public IP. Neither nc nor telnet are recognized commands. I think my computer is on lock down...
![alt text](image url)

Levrini

VB-104434 - All right, APKMirror links seems to be working again , but other kinds of js bugs are still there, for example sammobile:

@Levrini said in 6.6.3271.45 - JavaScript bug (VB-104434):

It was hard to find another site where this happens, but here is one: https://www.sammobile.com/firmwares/. When there, open any firmware page, there will be a custom drop-down selector for choosing a Country. In Vivaldi, the selector won't work and won't load any page.

Pathduck

@funkytoad My guess is you're on some sort of private business network, probably already set to use a VPN or Proxy outbound connection, which just blocks the connection to the Invisiv proxy.

You can check this here: chrome://net-internals/#proxy
It won't necessarily show up, the proxy connection might be set on the OS level.

You can install telnet as a standard part of Windows Features.
Netcat can be downloaded from http://nc110.sourceforge.io/
Or better as part of Nmap, named Ncat: https://nmap.org/download.html#windows
It's very useful for troubleshooting network connectivity.

You can also check connectivity with PowerShell, all Windows machines have it.

λ Test-NetConnection fastest.vivaldi.stations.invisv.com -port 443         

ComputerName     : fastest.vivaldi.stations.invisv.com                     
RemoteAddress    : 136.144.49.43                                           
RemotePort       : 443                                                     
InterfaceAlias   : Ethernet                                                
SourceAddress    : 192.168.0.10                                            
TcpTestSucceeded : True

You should also be able to open this url in the browser:
https://fastest.vivaldi.stations.invisv.com
You will get a warning about the certificate, choose proceed, you will get a message "method not allowed" which means you can connect.