Google Chrome Spinoff 'Iron' For Privacy Fanatics

Sonnet_XVIII writes "According to DownloadSquad, A German company SRWare has developed a Google Chrome Spin off called Iron aimed at people who are concerned or have questions about Google's policies for collecting usage data."

Since when

[szo (7842)]

we started to call forks a "spin off"?

Re:Since when

[Bryansix (761547)]

Somebody confused their Television terms with their Technical terms.

Re:Since when

[danieltdp (1287734)]

So, I wanna know when chrome's next season will begin. I heard it will be on the Linux channel

Translation

[Stooshie (993666)]

I only speak a little German. So here is a bery bad translation via babelfish:

SRWare Iron: The browser of the future - based on the free source text " Chromium" - without doubts with the data protection and security Googles Web browser chrome inspires with an extremely fast structure of web page, a slim Design and imaginative functions. The data-security commissioners practice however also criticism, approximately because of the production of a clear user ID or the transmission from inputs google for the generation of search proposals. SRWare Iron is a genuine alternative. The browser basedly on the Chromium source text and offers so the same basic functions as chrome - however without the criticized points, which concern the data protection. We could provide from there a browser, with which you can use immediately the innovative features, without having to think about the keeping of your privacy. We would like to leave and place our users at our work sharings the browser free of charge to the download under the name " SRWare Iron" in the net. What makes Iron concretely differently than chrome? Read here.

Removing Unique User ID

[gurps_npc (621217)]

That alone makes it far superior to Chrome.

Better name

[bennybertow (903069)]

They should have called it "Tinfoil" instead...

Re:

[fizzding (1171839)]

I dunno... "He's hiding something, clamp him in irons!" sounds about right to me.

Re:Better name

[MrNaz (730548)]

If you consider clearing cookies and basic privacy to be tinfoil type material, then may I have your email address? My ideas will intrigue you and I think you would like to subscribe to my newsletter.

Alert me when it runs on Mac and/or Linux.

[greenguy (162630)]

I promise not to make "dupe" comments.

Language

[craigavonite (918331)]

The SRWare site and the installer are in German, but the browser itself (menu's, etc.) is in English, just for anyone thinking you're going to have to hunt out an EnUs addon or something

You don't trust Google...

[John Hasler (414242)]

But you are expected to trust some obscure German software company. Right.

The sad thing is, some of you will (but then, you already use Windows...)

The differences

[nephridium (928664)]

According to the German webpage [srware.net] there are several significant improvements:

* unlike the current Chrome beta it uses the newest Webkit version of the current Chromium build

* it does not generate a unique ID of every client for use by Google

* no installation timestamp ill be generated for google

* no "suggest feature" that phones home to google (for help) what you type into the address bar

* will not phone home to google in case you mistyped a URL

* no phoning home for error reporting

* does not send RLZ tracking info to google, e.g. about when and where Chrome was downloaded

* NO frickin updater that installs itself as a startup app to run in the background

* does not load google homepage in background when the browser is loaded

Of course they provide the source code for your own tinkering as well, just don't hammer the poor fellas (more than they already get hammered right now ;)) as according to their page their current revenue only comes from the ads on the page and hopefully some donations by people showing their appreciation of their work.

IRC log from Iron

[by Anonymous Coward]

It's unfortunate that this guy decided to fork rather than submit bug fixes (or even file bugs). Several of the issues he identified are bugs, not intentional behavior in Chromium. It's supposed to be the case that anything that talks to a third-party server is controllable via preferences and options. He ran into a few that slipped through and decided to do a fork for self-publicity and $$ rather than trying to help the project. I see no problem with having forks in general, but this one seems unnecessary at this point.

Here's an excerpt from an IRC log on chromium-dev from a week ago when people asked him why he wasn't filing bugs or patches:

Iron: because a fork will bring a lot of publicity to my person and my homepage
Iron: that means: a lot of money too ;)
Iron: i dont take money for my fork
Iron: but i have adsense on my page ;)
Iron: a lot of visitor -> a lot of clicka > a lot of money ;)
Iron: we are here in germany
Iron: the press will love my fork
Iron: i talked to much journalists already
Iron: to remove all things in source talking to google ;)
Iron: nobody here trusts google
Iron: the german people say: google is very evil

Re:IRC log from Iron

[bmcage (785177)]

link please! I can make up your statement in 1..2..3, why would I believe this?

Re:IRC log from Iron

[Lord Bitman (95493)]

Chrome's been out for nearly a month now and I don't see any new release any time "soon".
With such a poor release, I expected new versions to come out the same day yet here we are, weeks later, and no sign that the problems are even on Google's radar.

If I pushed a product to millions of users by linking to it from the front page of the world's most popular website, saying it was "uncrashable", and then it turned out within minutes of real-world uses that no, it's just as easy to crash as any other browser (I've yet to see a "sad tab"), or any of the other major problems, etc- I'd work towards fixing them ASAP. Where is the new release? Where is the new alpha?

Google fucked up. Forking might wake them up. All good forks get merged in the end, anyway.

Re:Fanatical? use Opera

[AliasMarlowe (1042386)]

I configured Opera to clear all cookies at the end of every session. Occasionally, I also clear them during a session.

In Epiphany, I regularly clean out all cookies manually. I do this before and after visiting any e-commerce or financial site, even if I don't conduct any transactions.

It's no more fanatical than using a condom.

Re:Fanatical

[MrNaz (730548)]

I'm increasingly starting to think that Slashdot editors are being underhandedly paid by Google to subtly ridicule anti-Google articles or sentiments. The wording of this summary makes it pretty blatantly obvious that the editor wants to make people who are suspicious of Google appear "fanatical", implying all the baggage that that word carries with it these days.

How is it fanatical to not want to send your data to a private corporation? Would it be fanatical if that corporation was Microsoft, Sony or Universal Studios?

I clear my cookies regularly. What Slashdot calls fanatical I call routine. So I guess that makes me a fanatic.

Re:Fanatical

[redJag (662818)]

Fanatical people don't think of themselves as fanatical. Only the people that label them fanatical do..

Re:Fanatical

[Fred_A (10934)]

Only fanatics label other fanatics as being fanatical !

Re:Fanatical

[Sancho (17056)]

A reasonable person, or the average person? I don't think that the average person is reasonable.

The average person cares about having the newest car, the newest TV, a house they can't afford, etc. They want to keep up with the Joneses. They measure their own worth as relative to other people's possessions. Their own happiness depends upon being "better" than other people. That's not reasonable. That's why the American economy is in the mess that it's in. We're a society where the goal is to attain money any way you can. If you don't, you're a failure.

Reasonable? My ass.

Re:Fanatical

[RabidMonkey (30447)]

I won't pick points, but I don't think it's fair to roll 50% of the population into one bucket and assume things about them, right or wrong.

I'm sure you've never, in your entire life, done anything unreasonable, like wanting something because it looked cool, or sounded cool, or because you wanted to be the first kid on the block to have it, or because all of your friends had one.

All general statements are false.

Re:Fanatical

[Bryansix (761547)]

Uhm, because there is a box you have to check to OPT-IN to the program to send them that information.

You clear your cookies???!?!?!?

[RudeIota (1131331)]

Delete cookies?! [typepad.com]

Re:Fanatical

[British (51765)]

You're right. Here's an idea for safe browsing. Call it the "one time coffee shop" method.

1. Go to coffee shop & browse away
2. after surfing, torch the coffee house.

You can only do this once per coffee shop. Sadly, Starbucks doesn't supply computers since there's an abundance of said shops.

Re:Their promises are as good as their source

[denominateur (194939)]

The source code is available.