TrackMeNot -do you use it or similar?

[trekkiedane]

TrackMeNot, now compatible with Firefox 9.0, is a lightweight browser extension that helps protect web searchers from surveillance and data-profiling by search engines. It does so not by means of concealment or encryption (i.e. covering one's tracks), but instead, paradoxically, by the opposite strategy: noise and obfuscation. With TrackMeNot, actual web searches, lost in a cloud of false leads, are essentially hidden in plain view. User-installed TrackMeNot works with the Firefox Browser and popular search engines (AOL, Yahoo!, Google, and Bing) and requires no 3rd-party servers or services.

From: nyu.edu

Do you use this or similar software to try and fly below the radar of 'Big Brother'?




I use it, even if I don't believe it helps insuring my privacy; if some entity wants to know about me, I don't believe it's possible to hide well enough for them not to find out whatever they want...

Nevertheless I find the queries TMN is using quite funny... 'Read jerry' and 'Nigerians' are ones I've just seen TMN use, 'more seat width than', 'Please note that benzo', 'Outdoors Maryland allows citizens', and 'have their students come' are ones I found in the list of 'current queries'

Do notice i called them "quite funny" not , say, "very funny".

 

[Vulcan Princess]

I do academic work on potentially controversial subjects (my current project is researching whether the TSA's grope-fest has any effect on aviation terrorism), so I use Tor when conducting online research. I don't really need my search strings freaking out anyone who might be monitoring things.

I've also installed Https Everywhere in Firefox. It switches to https on supported sites.

 

[the 4th hanson bro]

I have TrackMeNot running on Firefox, have for a while now.

I do academic work on potentially controversial subjects (my current project is researching whether the TSA's grope-fest has any effect on aviation terrorism)

My suspicion is that it doesn't. Does your research include anything on what the TSA is reporting as "successes" and the attendant mission creep? i.e., catching deadbeat dads and drug smugglers.

 

[Kestra]

I don't use anything like this. I can see why people want to, and I might in the future, but not at the moment.

 

[Lumi]

Nope, I have no reason to... nothing to hide.

 

[Vulcan Princess]

I have TrackMeNot running on Firefox, have for a while now.

I do academic work on potentially controversial subjects (my current project is researching whether the TSA's grope-fest has any effect on aviation terrorism)

My suspicion is that it doesn't. Does your research include anything on what the TSA is reporting as "successes" and the attendant mission creep? i.e., catching deadbeat dads and drug smugglers.

My current project doesn't deal directly with mission creep, but it's a side issue I'm going to analyze. It's a law review article, so the statistics are used to bolster my point (which is that the TSA's grope-fest violates the right to interstate travel); they're not an end in themselves.