Privacy Without Compromise: Proton VPN is Now Built Into Vivaldi

Pesala

There have been a lot of comments about the extension being installed and enabled just by clicking the VPN button. It would be better if nothing was installed or enabled without user consent. I am sure that the extension is trustworthy, but users may wonder why they need it. Vivaldi 7.3 was a surprise, with no snapshot testing before its launch.

electryon

@Taiga said in Privacy Without Compromise: Proton VPN is Now Built Into Vivaldi:

Vivaldi could adopt Brave's free and open source ad block engine, which is light-years better, but they don't.

They can't adopt Shield's code.
Why do you think NOBODY hasn't done it or even considers to do it even now with the MV3 situation?
Because Brave's license requires anyone using Shields to add a Brave advertisement on it.
Nobody is going to do that. Vivaldi will never agree to add an ad of a competitor lol.
Yes, Brave is such a hypocrite. They get more than 95% of their code from someone else without them having to follow ridiculous licenses.
But they feel justified to open source with ridiculous licenses nobody would agree on them.
Why? Because they don't really want someone to fork anything from them, they even sued forks in the past lol.

Catweazle

@Stardust said in Privacy Without Compromise: Proton VPN is Now Built Into Vivaldi:

@Catweazle said in Privacy Without Compromise: Proton VPN is Now Built Into Vivaldi:

@Stardust, even in this case it is inactive and renovable like any oyher extension, also with an click,

This is not good installing something without user confirmation

Same for other features and tools installed without your consent (Translation? some default search engines, even Google?), but requested by others. I don't see a problem to offer an feature which you can easy delete if you don't want it, as almost anything in Vivaldi.

electryon

@Catweazle said in Privacy Without Compromise: Proton VPN is Now Built Into Vivaldi:

@Stardust said in Privacy Without Compromise: Proton VPN is Now Built Into Vivaldi:

@Catweazle said in Privacy Without Compromise: Proton VPN is Now Built Into Vivaldi:

@Stardust, even in this case it is inactive and renovable like any oyher extension, also with an click,

This is not good installing something without user confirmation

Same for other features and tools installed without your consent (Translation? some default search engines, even Google?), but requested by others. I don't see a problem to offer an feature which you can easy delete if you don't want it, as almost anything in Vivaldi.

If I were Vivaldi I would just hide the extension from the extensions page.
It's very easy not to show an installed extension there.
Many extensions in all browsers are packed this way in order to be uninstallable.
Vivaldi, Chrome, Brave, Edge, Opera, Firefox etc, all browsers come with various uninstallable extensions pre-installed.
This way they wouldn't have anything to complain lol.
Sometimes I think Vivaldi is just too nice and the people who like to complain will complain no matter what.
They should make the extension uninstallable and be done with it.

Nekomajin

@Catweazle
That's different. Search engines and speed dial ads don't add any code to the browser itself. Built-in features are made by Vivaldi, while this one is a third-party extension. I don't think it contains any malicious code, I use some Proton products and other extensions too. I may use this one too. But still, it's not made by Vivaldi. And it can be turned off, but a new button shows up on the toolbar and it installs an extension on the first click. It's just the principle to show a confirmation popup wheneven the user installs/activates a third-party product.

Not to mention the fact that many of the users, even of Vivaldi, don't read the release notes or the welcome page after update. They can genuinely think that it's a malicious extension corrupting their browser. It would be practical to pop up a short message about the new feature and ask for permission to install at the same time.

Gort

@Stardust said in Privacy Without Compromise: Proton VPN is Now Built Into Vivaldi:

I am confused, if you click on that new VPN button, will Proton VPN extension be installed without any confirmation? This is pretty bad imo

While I'm fine with the inclusion of this VPN, I do think it's wrong to have this install without any confirmation or warning by simply clicking the toolbar button. There could have been a confirmation dialogue on first start with the new feature or just a confirmation when clicking the button (preferably the first).

barbudo2005

@Nekomajin

Said:

It would be practical to pop up a short message about the new feature and ask for permission to install at the same time.

Agree. But please a little more indulgence with the team.

Said:

They can genuinely think that it's a malicious extension corrupting their browser.

So they either chose Vivaldi blindly or they don't understand his philosophy at all.

Stardust

@Catweazle said in Privacy Without Compromise: Proton VPN is Now Built Into Vivaldi:

@Stardust said in Privacy Without Compromise: Proton VPN is Now Built Into Vivaldi:

@Catweazle said in Privacy Without Compromise: Proton VPN is Now Built Into Vivaldi:

@Stardust, even in this case it is inactive and renovable like any oyher extension, also with an click,

This is not good installing something without user confirmation

Same for other features and tools installed without your consent (Translation? some default search engines, even Google?), but requested by others. I don't see a problem to offer an feature which you can easy delete if you don't want it, as almost anything in Vivaldi.

Proton VPN is a 3rd party addon.

@Nekomajin said in Privacy Without Compromise: Proton VPN is Now Built Into Vivaldi:

@Catweazle
That's different. Search engines and speed dial ads don't add any code to the browser itself. Built-in features are made by Vivaldi, while this one is a third-party extension. I don't think it contains any malicious code, I use some Proton products and other extensions too. I may use this one too. But still, it's not made by Vivaldi. And it can be turned off, but a new button shows up on the toolbar and it installs an extension on the first click. It's just the principle to show a confirmation popup wheneven the user installs/activates a third-party product.

Not to mention the fact that many of the users, even of Vivaldi, don't read the release notes or the welcome page after update. They can genuinely think that it's a malicious extension corrupting their browser. It would be practical to pop up a short message about the new feature and ask for permission to install at the same time.

well said

electryon

@Stardust said in Privacy Without Compromise: Proton VPN is Now Built Into Vivaldi:

@Catweazle said in Privacy Without Compromise: Proton VPN is Now Built Into Vivaldi:

@Stardust said in Privacy Without Compromise: Proton VPN is Now Built Into Vivaldi:

@Catweazle said in Privacy Without Compromise: Proton VPN is Now Built Into Vivaldi:

@Stardust, even in this case it is inactive and renovable like any oyher extension, also with an click,

This is not good installing something without user confirmation

Proton VPN is a 3rd party addon.

No, it's not. It is installed by Vivaldi and Vivaldi is responsible it won't do anything bad.
Proton is now a Vivaldi partner, not a 3rd party extension you installed yourself and Vivaldi is not responsible for.
With that logic Lingvanex is a 3rd party. It's not. It's shipped by Vivaldi, it is a part of Vivaldi and Vivaldi is responsible for it.

Athasair

I saw, I gawked, and I screenshotted.
That landing page is now part of my very happy history.
I am so happy to see the alliance of my Internet Heroes, Vivaldi and Proton!
Been a Proton fan forever, and an Opera now Vivaldi fan forever, so..

It's like Gandalf gets a Spaceship..

HUG

Love it.

Best Friends Forever!

Stardust

@electryon said in Privacy Without Compromise: Proton VPN is Now Built Into Vivaldi:

No, it's not. It is installed by Vivaldi and Vivaldi is responsible it won't do anything bad.
Proton is now a Vivaldi partner, not a 3rd party extension you installed yourself and Vivaldi is not responsible for.
With that logic Lingvanex is a 3rd party. It's not. It's shipped by Vivaldi, it is a part of Vivaldi and Vivaldi is responsible for it.

nor sure about Lingvanex, but I see Proton VPN as 3rd party extension

Nekomajin

@electryon
Does Proton VPN run on Vivaldi servers. No. That's exactly the definition of third-party.

electryon

@Nekomajin said in Privacy Without Compromise: Proton VPN is Now Built Into Vivaldi:

@electryon
Does Proton VPN run on Vivaldi servers. No. That's exactly the definition of third-party.

You can see it anything you want.
Firefox VPN runs on Mullvad servers. So?
But it is not a 3rd party product when it is intergrated in Vivaldi and it can work with a Vivaldi account.
And since it is included in Vivaldi, Vivaldi has the responsibility for it to work properly.
It is now a part of Vivaldi.

Athlonite

Nice that Vivaldi have caught upto their nemesis Opera but I uninstalled Proton as soon as I found I couldn't change the country without being asked to Upgrade

gabrielwoj

Not liking how some of the updates to Vivaldi has been deployed recently. Some things like setting the announcement of a new default search engine (which, at least, they asked the user if they wanted to change to it, and it didn't set automatically to default, so that's something).

Then there was the "Share Vivaldi" icon that seems to show up in every new update. I'm not someone who really posts on Social Media that much or send links to others for things I use, and, changing browsers is something that not everyone does. It takes time to learn the new design and everything.

I already dislike the other browsers adding too much social media integration, and while the "Share Vivaldi" icon is just a "copy this message + link", it still feels similar to it.

And now, this VPN partnership. It's possible that I'm not the only one, but I use Vivaldi more for the personalization-side than for privacy. Vivaldi never felt like a too heavily privacy-heavy browser to me, especially because part of the code is closed (mostly the visual elements), while the backend is open, since it's based off Chromium.

"Free VPNs" have for the most part, being very sketchy. I'm not doubting ProtonVPN's stance on how they handle the data, but there has been other browsers in the past with "free" VPNs that would take an absurd amount of user data. Although I haven't clicked the "VPN" icon when the update was released, I'm not sure if the pop-up that appears is perfectly clear and transparent with how the data is handled when using the free version.

Definitely not a fan of the extension just installing by automatic. An user could have just closed the "what's new tab page" of the update, and not realizing why the button was there, or, may just click it out of sheer curiosity. As well that this is a third-party extension and not integrated into the browser itself (which, still should require an user-input to allow it or not).

Lastly, companies can change CEO positions, and their values can change as well. I wouldn't feel safe in using a third-party extension that could have that happen, and so happen that their free VPN service data handling completely changes, which may or may not be warned for the users, as it's Proton-sided and not Vivaldi-sided. Yes, I use some third-party extensions to enhance my browser, but this was my decision, user-input, meanwhile this VPN thing is, for the most part, user-oriented, but those who clicked it installed without others knowing.

I do understand the reasons with these partnerships and stuff, keeping this somewhat-niche browser is difficult money-wise, so I can get past by things like the "Share Vivaldi" icon and such, but the way this VPN partnership was handled was not very well. While I haven't been a user of the snapshots release, it would be more appropriate to test these out (with proper user-input and acknowledgement when pressing things).

Will probably be still sticking to Vivaldi despite this, as I use more for personalization-side and not privacy, but those last additions to the browser have been slowly adding a sense of mistrust to the team for me. This can still be "salvaged" by adding proper user-prompts and not installing the thing altogether by just clicking on it. And while we speak, the ProtonVPN extension page already have been getting some 1 out of 5 stars by Vivaldi users who didn't ask to get installed, so not a very good look.

I don't normally post here on these forums, but I have been using Vivaldi since its very early days. I have enjoyed the browser very much since then, and I applaud to everyone to the community and the developers who have been hard at work in making this cool customization-rich browser. But at the same time, I hope these recent decisions may be more planned throughout before releasing to every Vivaldi user.

JyuSensei

@ThePfromtheO

So...
Workspaces, just a half baked window within a window. Would be useful if each workspace had their own speed dial.
Dashboard, just a half baked widget implementation that would steal space from my speed dials. Besides, I like having stuff in their designated place, not everything jammed into a single place.
Mail client, since it's implementation not once have I managed to get gmail oauth to stick after a relaunching the browser. And frankly speaking, an inferior product to Opera 12 mail client.
Calendar, have to use Outlook.
New Address bar, it is a fucking mess of recommending the wrong things all the time. Disabled all that shit, it only shows the url now.
Content blocker, 1/4 baked blocker with the functionality of a wet noddle in a tug competition.
VPN, I tried the Proton free tier before. For what I want it is not worth to pay the full price of it.

TyrionTargaryen

Silly nitpick. I already had the Proton VPN extension installed, logged in to my account and all.
Since this update, the icon is replaced with the VPN button. Is there a way to restore the Proton VPN extension icon? I find it more visually appealing that a text button next to all my text-less extension icons.

Edit: Just wanted to let others know, if you remove the "VPN" button from the toolbar with the Proton VPN extension already installed, the Proton VPN icon reappears. So it's a very easy fix. Just right click on the "VPN" icon and choose "Customize Toolbar" then drag the button off the toolbar.

Edit2: Something has changed overnight. Today I started Vivaldi on the desktop and the Proton icon has been replaced with the "VPN" text icon. Removing it from the interface disables the extension. In the end I had to drag it to the status bar because it looks ugly next to the other extension icons. I hope this is a bug and not a choice by Vivaldi to remove user choice.

Edit3: That was no solution. If you click on the VPN icon on the status bar, the VPN icon becomes duplicated again next to the other extensions. This is really weird and undesirable.

Taiga

@electryon Well, the only browsers based on Chromium I'm aware of are Edge, Chrome, Vivaldi, Slimjet, and Brave. I think there is another, more recent browser, but its name eludes me. I think it's obvious why Chrome wouldn't adopt it, but it's common for browsers not to implement useful features, even features one might think are fundamental to a browser. For example, Vivaldi is the only browser I'm aware of that has advanced history and bookmark management and session management. Normally, one would need a third-party extension for these things.

But you make a fair point. I wasn't aware of that. When I looked at the license, I didn't see anything like that. However, it still doesn't contend with the overarching point, which is Vivaldi's apparent lack of interest in the built-in ad blocker. Like I said, I hope this new partnership will lead to greater investment in and major improvements to the built-in ad blocker to make it as powerful as Brave's. If not, then I'm not sure what they're going for here.

zmeYpc

Interesting side effect: the Currency widget stops working when using Proton VPN. I think this is due to some Norway <> Netherlands blocking. EDIT1: It is working again; initially there was an error message "Failed to fetch exchange rates."
Incidentally, https://mail.bg (a Bulgarian email provider) also blocks Proton VPN. EDIT2: According to my previous tests, the mail.bg blocking of Proton VPN does not happen if you change to a special US (not all VPN servers are good), UK or DE Proton IP.
We are in need of a whitelist implementation.

luetage

@zmeYpc Good catch, but I’m not sure Vivaldi can do something about that.