How To: Chrome Shares Your Activity with Google - Here's How to Use Comodo Dragon to Block It

Previously, we talked about how to secure Firefox.  Today, we will talk about securing a Chromium based Browser.  Why?  Because Chrome recently beat Firefox in holding more customers. 

It is obvious that Google Chrome tracks our every move online, so what alternatives is out there based on the Chromium Browser?  The ideal browser would have to be something that protects our privacy and security, right?

In this article, I will talk about how to secure the browser and what extensions you can use for the best security and privacy.  

Introducing Comodo Dragon

Comodo Dragon is a chromium based browser which, unlike Google Chrome, Dragon respects your privacy and security.  It works exactly the same as Google, although it has stripped out the tracking and added extra security and privacy measures. 

Here is a short run down from Comodo Dragon: 

• Improved privacy over Google Chrome;
• Easy SSL Certificate identification;
• Greater stability and less memory bloat.

Comodo Dragon Requirements:

• Windows 7, Vista or XP both 32 and 64 bit are supported; 
• 128 MB RAM minimum; and
• 40 MB Hard Disk Space.

Recommended Comodo Dragon Settings:

The following are located under the "options" panel. Feel free to choose your own settings - these are the ones that I have personally picked for ultimate privacy and security. 

Basics:

Home Page: I recommend using a search engine that doesn't track your IP address and supports a Secure Socket Layer (SSL): Startpage or DuckDuckGo.  When using DuckDuckGo for even more privacy, use the HTML version rather than JavaScript.  

Search: un check "enable instant for faster searching".

Personal Stuff:

Users: It is a good idea to create several profiles.  In example, a developer profile (for testing new extensions), a security and privacy based profile along with one for each user that uses your computer - although that doesn't stop them from snooping around in your profile. 

Passwords: Click "Never Save Passwords".  Use a Freeware program such as LastPass or people with Norton Antivirus and Norton360 can use "Identity Safe".  

Autofill: Best to un-check this. 

Under the hood

Content Settings: Check "Block third party cookies, and clear cookies and other site and plug-in data when I close my browser".  Further - check "Do not allow any site to track my physical location".  

Privacy: Check the following: "Start browser in incognito mode", "Clear history and cookies at exit", "Do not allow websites to know where you came from (suppress HTTP Referrer header)", "Enable phishing and malware protection", "Enable malware domain filtering (Comodo Secure DNS)".  The last two should be un-checked when you're really serious about being anonymous on the internet.  However security as important also so I left them checked.  For the rest that were not mentioned above, please un-check them. 

HTTPS/SSL: Click "Check for server certificate revocation". 

Comodo Dragon add-ons

Extensions are becoming more and more important for everyone these days.  Extensions let people customise their browser to their own needs.  I often get asked whether the browser has many extensions compatible with it.  Since Comodo Dragon is a chromium based browser - it supports all extensions that Google Chrome does.  Just head to the Chrome web store and you will be presented with 100s of extensions to choose from.  Here are a few good privacy and security extensions:

Hide My Ass! Web Proxy:  This one let's you enter the URL of a website you want to visit and it proxies it so the owner doesn't know your IP address. 

ScriptNo: This isn't all so different from the Firefox extension "NoScript".  

AdBlock Plus for Google Chrome: This is a fantastic app - a real must for everyone.  It cleans out web-pages and makes them load faster by removing ads. 

WOT (Web of Trust): This is another must have extension.  It lets you know what websites are safe to visit and what isn't.  It also will let you know whether the web page is suitable to minors.  

LastPass: Too many passwords? Hard to remember them all? Encrypt them with LastPass and use one main password to log in to all your websites.