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theHandpuppet

(19,964 posts) Fri Oct 25, 2013, 08:04 AM Oct 2013

NSA spying row leads firm to expose who's watching while you surf

http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/lifestyle/technology-gadgets/mozilla-lightbeam-for-firefox-nsa-spying-row-leads-firm-to-expose-whos-watching-while-you-surf-29697872.html

Mozilla Lightbeam for Firefox: NSA spying row leads firm to expose who's watching while you surf
The new Lightbeam software from Mozilla, the team behind the Firefox browser, claims to be a watershed moment in the battle for web transparency
By Adam Sherwin – 24 October 2013

Mozilla's Lightbeam for Firefox, a download produced by the US free software community behind the ever-popular browser, is claiming to a 'watershed' moment in the battle for web transparency.

Everyone who browses the Internet leaves a digital trail used by advertisers to discover what your interests are.

Users who activate Lightbeam will be able to see a real-time visualisation of every site they visit and every third-party that is active on those sites, including commercial organisations which might potentially be sharing your data.

Mozilla wants users who install the Lightbeam add-on to Firefox, to crowd-source their data, to produce the first “big picture” view of web tracking, revealing which third-parties are most active.... MORE

6 replies

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NSA spying row leads firm to expose who's watching while you surf (Original Post) theHandpuppet Oct 2013 OP

Mozilla wants to track the trackers /nt jakeXT Oct 2013 #1

how to download lightbeam bananas Oct 2013 #2

There's probably an NSA back door in the software! randome Oct 2013 #3

It shows a chart bananas Oct 2013 #4

Maybe it is easy to understand for some. (I can't run the demo at work.) randome Oct 2013 #5

"Mozilla Lightbeam, formerly known as Collusion, has recently been upgraded to version 1" bananas Oct 2013 #6

jakeXT

(10,575 posts)

1. Mozilla wants to track the trackers /nt

Reply to theHandpuppet (Original post)

Fri Oct 25, 2013, 08:10 AM

Oct 2013

bananas

(27,509 posts)

2. how to download lightbeam

Reply to theHandpuppet (Original post)

Fri Oct 25, 2013, 09:12 AM

Oct 2013

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/lightbeam/

Apparently they've renamed "collusion" to "lightbeam".
If you already have collusion, it will be renamed to lightbeam.

Link from https://support.mozilla.org/mn/questions/975282

Also see reddit subthread http://www.reddit.com/r/technology/comments/1p6dfb/mozilla_lightbeam_for_firefox_exposes_whos/ccz9fzn

randome

(34,845 posts)

3. There's probably an NSA back door in the software!

Reply to theHandpuppet (Original post)

Fri Oct 25, 2013, 09:16 AM

Oct 2013

Probably not. But I bet the report this app spits out is an enormous stream of IP addresses and web site verbiage that most won't comprehend.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]Treat your body like a machine. Your mind like a castle.[/center][/font][hr]

bananas

(27,509 posts)

4. It shows a chart

Reply to randome (Reply #3)

Fri Oct 25, 2013, 09:21 AM

Oct 2013

They have a demo/explanation here: http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/collusion/

They used to call it "collusion" instead of "lightbeam",
I tried it out before and it's easy to understand.

randome

(34,845 posts)

5. Maybe it is easy to understand for some. (I can't run the demo at work.)

Reply to bananas (Reply #4)

Fri Oct 25, 2013, 09:26 AM

Oct 2013

But most computer users don't have much of a concept of what their computers actually do beyond going to UTube and news sites.

Most of the time a developer says how easy something is, they are still not putting themselves into the shoes of someone who doesn't know and doesn't care about the details of their computers.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]Treat your body like a machine. Your mind like a castle.[/center][/font][hr]

bananas

(27,509 posts)

6. "Mozilla Lightbeam, formerly known as Collusion, has recently been upgraded to version 1"

Reply to theHandpuppet (Original post)

Fri Oct 25, 2013, 09:27 AM

Oct 2013

http://www.ghacks.net/2013/10/25/mozilla-lightbeam-formerly-collusion-visualizes-first-third-party-connections/

<snip>

Mozilla Lightbeam, formerly known as Collusion, has recently been upgraded to version 1, a major new version of the add-on for the Firefox web browser (the latest version right now is 1.0.2). The new version comes with performance improvements, as well as better controls over the visualization in the interface.

<snip>

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