probably something in the settings that is blocking Apple telemetry ... I am just guessing
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Best Mac Adblocker for PRIVACY and data protection? [MERGED]
- Thread starter Silly John Fatty
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probably something in the settings that is blocking Apple telemetry ... I am just guessing
You shouldn't need to fully stop AdGuard; you should just be able to disable it for Mail (only). Is that possible?
preferences -> network -> application and disable mail
I did. I went through everything with the Support, too. I deleted by appcleaner, by hand...
I really don't know. And even Adguard support has no clue. Every other mail client works with it.
Mailmate? No problem. As soon as I turn on Adguard, Mail is using all CPU, all RAM and stops working causing the battery to melt.
I did that, too. No success.
i am only guessing, but I assume Apple Mail is trying to reach a domain and Adgaurd is blocking it so it causing a loop that is leading to the high heat
That's the one thing I didn't try... removing all Email accounts and have a look if there is a problem with one of the accounts connecting to a server that is blocked.
I was assuming that the Mail.app is the culprit. But then, why are other apps like Mailmate working? hmmm
But it doesn't matter, I'm using the Safari plugin and a secure VPN right now and it works fine.
If you have an adblocker like ublock origin or 1blockr or adguard they all do the same thing (work pretty much the same). With Brave its just built in.
Something to note here, browser adblockers like in Brave block only website ads. Other adblocking methods block device wide or even network wide (anything connected to the wifi network) including trackers.
Brave also has the anti fingerprinting, on one of my non macs running it I also have a random user agent plug-in that changes the user agent every few minutes or so
Firefox + uBlock Origin.
Both the browser and the extension are open source, and they work amazingly well.
Both the browser and the extension are open source, and they work amazingly well.
Safari and AdGuard on all my devices (Mac mini M2, iPhone 14 Pro, iPad Pro M1).
If you search the internet there is a consensus that Brave is the most secure+private web browser by researchers
I would say Wipr, but I just noticed it doesn't block Twitch ads. It's very good at blocking YouTube ads though. Sometimes it ads a few seconds lag before playing the video, but I'd rather that than ads.
Like real researchers or like “trust the experts” researchers?
What browser do they recommend?
I've been using AdGuard for the past month or so, and while it does block all ads, I'm not sure how privacy friendly it is. When I created this thread, I should have specified that "best" doesn't equal "the one that blocks all ads" but especially also "the one that doesn't eat and process your data".
Now I kind of regret buying AdGuard a little bit, because it's Russian. Then again, since they moved it pretty soon to Cyprus, you may think it's the "good" Russians, who left Russia. But Cyprus is also associated with all kinds of shady stuff …
Also to those who joined the convo recently, you'll find some analysis of me on the previous pages of the Terms & Conditions of AdGuard, and basically it said it multiple places that it can share and sell all your data if you agree with it (and I suppose when you install it, and you click that "agree" button, you agree with it, by, well, who guess it, agreeing with it …).
In addition to that, Little Snitch (a software that tracks all your incoming and outgoing connections) shows me that with AdGuard, basically your ENTIRE traffic goes through AdGuard.
So maybe I should re-open a new topic and ask what's the best Ad blocker not just for blocking ads but for your entire privacy, because most of you guys in this thread are fixed on the ad-blocking part, but "best" for me doesn't include just that. Best means BEST, which means best in all categories, not just one chosen category. That's why I changed the topic title now to not attract people anymore who just want to discuss ad-blocking abilities and ignore the whole rest that I find very important.
And one more thing: All browser extensions fail this test imo, simply because browser extensions are a well-known security risk in browsers. So no browser extension can be a good answer here.
Now I kind of regret buying AdGuard a little bit, because it's Russian. Then again, since they moved it pretty soon to Cyprus, you may think it's the "good" Russians, who left Russia. But Cyprus is also associated with all kinds of shady stuff …
Also to those who joined the convo recently, you'll find some analysis of me on the previous pages of the Terms & Conditions of AdGuard, and basically it said it multiple places that it can share and sell all your data if you agree with it (and I suppose when you install it, and you click that "agree" button, you agree with it, by, well, who guess it, agreeing with it …).
In addition to that, Little Snitch (a software that tracks all your incoming and outgoing connections) shows me that with AdGuard, basically your ENTIRE traffic goes through AdGuard.
So maybe I should re-open a new topic and ask what's the best Ad blocker not just for blocking ads but for your entire privacy, because most of you guys in this thread are fixed on the ad-blocking part, but "best" for me doesn't include just that. Best means BEST, which means best in all categories, not just one chosen category. That's why I changed the topic title now to not attract people anymore who just want to discuss ad-blocking abilities and ignore the whole rest that I find very important.
And one more thing: All browser extensions fail this test imo, simply because browser extensions are a well-known security risk in browsers. So no browser extension can be a good answer here.
I recently bought AdGuard when it was 'on sale', but somewhat reluctantly because of concerns about privacy. Though in fairness that is likely to be an issue with any program/extension that needs to access everything your browser is loading to actually work.
It works well enough, except that whitelisting individual sites doesn't always work (a known limitation with AG). For example I can't stream stuff from a favourite site of mine – sbs.com.au/ondemand – without turning AG off completely. If anybody knows a way around this please enlighten me.
I did buy AG just for Safari, as I have uBlock Origin in Firefox which works fine, including whitelisting. FF is already my main browser and I am starting to wonder if I should largely give up on Safari.
I can handle static ads/elements, but the dynamic ones drive me up the freaking wall and make a webpage/site largely unusable for me.
So a big thanks to Apple for breaking uBlock Origin on Safari. 🤬🤬🤬
Back to trying out a whole bunch of other ad blockers, I guess. Or just giving up on Safari, which I really don't want to do.
*sigh*
It works well enough, except that whitelisting individual sites doesn't always work (a known limitation with AG). For example I can't stream stuff from a favourite site of mine – sbs.com.au/ondemand – without turning AG off completely. If anybody knows a way around this please enlighten me.
I did buy AG just for Safari, as I have uBlock Origin in Firefox which works fine, including whitelisting. FF is already my main browser and I am starting to wonder if I should largely give up on Safari.
I can handle static ads/elements, but the dynamic ones drive me up the freaking wall and make a webpage/site largely unusable for me.
So a big thanks to Apple for breaking uBlock Origin on Safari. 🤬🤬🤬
Back to trying out a whole bunch of other ad blockers, I guess. Or just giving up on Safari, which I really don't want to do.
*sigh*
The combination of Safari + a "Safari Content Blocker" such as Wipr or 1Blocker is a great first step. Combine that with DNS filtering (such as NextDNS or OpenDNS) and you've got a great setup.
Why Safari "Content Blockers"? Because they are basically rule sets. Wipr and 1Blocker don't read the data and change it. Instead, they create rules for Safari to interpret (e.g. ignore this web content, remove these HTML tags). From a privacy standpoint, this is what you want. Those apps aren't reading your websites. They are only providing updated rules to Safari on what content should be filtered out.
The difference is that 1Blocker (for example) also has an extension (which is in addition to the Content Blocker portion of the product) for blocking ads through JavaScript. This helps with YouTube. Fortunately, Safari allows you to specify if the extension should have access to EVERY website that you visit, or JUST YouTube. I have it configured to only see YouTube. The content blocker is always enabled and all I need 99% of the time.
Too many people misunderstand why Apple changed the rules for Extensions. I think it's great. It was a huge step forward in limiting data access for extensions and ad-blockers. That's what I want for privacy.
Why Safari "Content Blockers"? Because they are basically rule sets. Wipr and 1Blocker don't read the data and change it. Instead, they create rules for Safari to interpret (e.g. ignore this web content, remove these HTML tags). From a privacy standpoint, this is what you want. Those apps aren't reading your websites. They are only providing updated rules to Safari on what content should be filtered out.
The difference is that 1Blocker (for example) also has an extension (which is in addition to the Content Blocker portion of the product) for blocking ads through JavaScript. This helps with YouTube. Fortunately, Safari allows you to specify if the extension should have access to EVERY website that you visit, or JUST YouTube. I have it configured to only see YouTube. The content blocker is always enabled and all I need 99% of the time.
Too many people misunderstand why Apple changed the rules for Extensions. I think it's great. It was a huge step forward in limiting data access for extensions and ad-blockers. That's what I want for privacy.
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I also regret buying it. It doesn't work properly with my Mac and support wasn't very helpful. To it's defense I have to sa that the Adguard app ads some kind of VPN like behavior so it routes your traffic to stop ads not only in your browser but in your apps, too.
But yea, for this you have to trust them like you have to trust every VPN provider.
Edit: I have installed WIPR now and it's working great hand in hand with Mullvad VPN.
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like any researcher. Look it up on any search engine.
adguard is recommded by privacy enthusiasts:
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if you are still paranoid, PiHole is your answer for a network wide adblocker without browser extension.
No. Adguards DNS Service is recommended. And the iOS app. Not the Mac app.
So what they are recommending are the open source parts of AdGuard.
I don’t think it is paranoid to be cautious with AdGuard because of their roots. You have to trust them. And trust is very personal. I, per example, trust your recommendations because I have read all your posts in the 1Password thread and I know that you do a ton of research. But others might not
.IMHO Adguard works great and does a great job in blocking everything. Cross Plattform. So it’s a matter of trust. If you don’t feel great about it, don’t use it.
The real thing is: if you really care about privacy, use Firefox. With a good VPN, in combination with nextdns. Or as you mentioned a raspberry pi with pihole and your own vpn.
What would be the best Ad Blocker to be used as a Safari plug-in, under Ventura, compatible/native on Silicon Macs? Preferably a free/open source one, but I'm ready to pay a reasonable price to get web navigation peace. I want to kill ALL these pesky &%$#@ ads on almsot all web sites. What are your recommendations?
AdGuard for Safari. There is no better option IMHO.
No. Adguards DNS Service is recommended. And the iOS app. Not the Mac app.
So what they are recommending are the open source parts of AdGuard.
I don’t think it is paranoid to be cautious with AdGuard because of their roots. You have to trust them. And trust is very personal. I, per example, trust your recommendations because I have read all your posts in the 1Password thread and I know that you do a ton of research. But others might not
IMHO Adguard works great and does a great job in blocking everything. Cross Plattform. So it’s a matter of trust. If you don’t feel great about it, don’t use it.
The real thing is: if you really care about privacy, use Firefox. With a good VPN, in combination with nextdns. Or as you mentioned a raspberry pi with pihole and your own vpn.
Well you do have a point when you say not to trust the closed source parts. IDK why some companies do this where they FOSS some parts and others parts they do not.
Yes trust has to do with it. So far no stink has been around adgaurd and they have a good record. Their whole business model is around blocking privacy, trackers, and advertisements so if they turn up to be one of the culprits that some serious conflict of interest.
@Silly John Fatty
The problem with the Adguard app is that its https filtering decrypts all your https encrypted data and is able to read everything, from passwords to bank accounts. This is done by installing a root certificate which is in general a very very bad idea.
It's working great but... it's messing with stuff no app should mess with.
And compared to the combination of a simple content blocker like Wipr and a trustworthy VPN service like Mullvad I can see no difference. But the content blocker and VPN don't have access to your encrypted data and don't mess around in your system on a root certificate level.
I see no benefit in using the Adguard app. It isn't even simpler than the VPN and content blocker combination.
And as a bonus, the VPN adds a privacy layer because it hides what you are doing from your ISP/work/school/public WIFI/...