Guess we will need to stay away from Edge

3 years ago by Malin to c/privacyguides

Microsoft Edge has many convenient features to improve your browsing experience. However, some of those features raise privacy concerns. One, for example, sends images you view directly to Microsoft.

backup, just in case the original link goes down

EponymousBosh 45 points 3 years ago

Was "staying away from Edge" not already standard?

path: 0 111740, hotness: undefined, score: 45, children: 1
darkknight 14 points 3 years ago

It is for me

path: 0 111740 112013, hotness: undefined, score: 14, children: 0
TheButtonJustSpins 33 points 3 years ago

Ridiculous.
Also, probably shouldn't use Edge in general. I only use it at work, since it's mandated.

path: 0 102495, hotness: undefined, score: 33, children: 2
b000rg 3 points 3 years ago

You'd think that more corporations would be worried about corporate espionage through web browsers, email clients, etc. all being created by one company with a history of bad privacy practices.

path: 0 102495 125072, hotness: undefined, score: 3, children: 1
meat_popsicle 4 points 3 years ago

Corporations don’t want to ditch their IE only intranets - they don’t have a choice but to use Edge for IE Mode now that IE is retired.

path: 0 102495 125072 129149, hotness: undefined, score: 4, children: 0
joyjoy 32 points 3 years ago

Why does the thumbnail for this article appear nowhere on the page? Here it is.

path: 0 127548, hotness: undefined, score: 32, children: 2
greybeard 6 points 3 years ago

My guess is that either the image was there and was edited out, or there is a metadata tag on the post that lists that as the thumbnail, but the page isn't otherwise using it.

path: 0 127548 128272, hotness: undefined, score: 6, children: 1
joyjoy 7 points 3 years ago

The tag is where I got it.

<meta property="og:image" content="https://cdn.neowin.com/news/images/uploaded/2023/06/1686566370_microsoft_shaq_meme_story.jpg" />
path: 0 127548 128272 129038, hotness: undefined, score: 7, children: 0
YellowtoOrange 31 points 3 years ago

I posted on /r/bing a few days how now you can't turn off tracking or history in edge but can't find the article and don't want to give reddit any traffic to check...

Stick to firefox.

path: 0 103198, hotness: undefined, score: 31, children: 6
timkmz 4 points 3 years ago

Fr, firefox with extensions on pc. And Kiwi browser with extensions on phone.

path: 0 103198 120240, hotness: undefined, score: 4, children: 5
pfannkuchen_gesicht 7 points 3 years ago

why not firefox on mobile?

path: 0 103198 120240 123959, hotness: undefined, score: 7, children: 4
b000rg 4 points 3 years ago

I was confused by this too, since Firefox on mobile has extension support

path: 0 103198 120240 123959 125024, hotness: undefined, score: 4, children: 1
LinkOpensChest_wav 1 point 3 years ago

Yep, and there are Beta or Nightly for people who also want about:config, or Fennec for people who want all that on a stable release

path: 0 103198 120240 123959 125024 217955, hotness: undefined, score: 1, children: 0
timkmz 2 points 3 years ago

Its similar to firefox with some other stuff like a adblock built in. You could achive the same with the firefox app but its just easier to do it like that and add the rest xd. And preference ofc

path: 0 103198 120240 123959 127523, hotness: undefined, score: 2, children: 0
XpeeN 1 point 3 years ago

Why not Mull on mobile?

path: 0 103198 120240 123959 343055, hotness: undefined, score: 1, children: 0
Mihuy 19 points 3 years ago

I mean I'm not surprised it's.... It's Microsoft.

path: 0 128135, hotness: undefined, score: 19, children: 0
drownedPhoenician 19 points 3 years ago

Edge is just an edgy meme at this point

path: 0 102482, hotness: undefined, score: 19, children: 0
Chais 18 points 3 years ago path: 0 114495, hotness: undefined, score: 18, children: 0
voynich 14 points 3 years ago

Edge isn't that bad of a browser. I don't appreciate the hate people sling at it without even trying it. It's seriously becoming a better browser than Firefox.

path: 0 112496, hotness: undefined, score: 14, children: 16
CheshireSnake 17 points 3 years ago

Like someone has said, we're in a privacy-oriented sub so it's natural (expected even) to expect the hate. Edge/MS really is bad in terms of privacy. So I get the hate.

With that said, privacy concerns aside, I have to agree that its reputation is worse than it really is. I was pleasantly surprised when I tried it, but my standard was IE so it wasn't really saying much lol. It's getting bad with unnecessary features, though.

As for being better than FF... well, of course in terms of privacy FF is still better imho. However, I rely on chromium-based browsers for work. Some internal sites I use for work simply don't play well with FF. I do have Brave, but I sometimes use Edge as well.

Is there a good chromium browser anyone can recommend? Is Brave the best privacy-wise? Vivaldi?

path: 0 112496 116877, hotness: undefined, score: 17, children: 2
Mihuy 5 points 3 years ago

Brave is more private than Vivaldi, but both options are good. Vivaldi's main focus isn't really privacy though. Like they don't sell your data nor collect it (other than some info to see I guess how many users there are?). So if you like the features that Vivaldi has (which is a lot) then VIvaldi sin't a bad option. So really just test em out and see what you like.

path: 0 112496 116877 128228, hotness: undefined, score: 5, children: 1
CheshireSnake 3 points 3 years ago

Thanks! I'm not sure I'll be using many of Vivaldi's features but it's nice to know they're a good option. I'll stick with Brave for now. Too many features scare me.

path: 0 112496 116877 128228 128825, hotness: undefined, score: 3, children: 0
avapa 16 points 3 years ago

Hmm, I don’t know… Leaving privacy aside (we are on /c/privacyguides mind you) it’s not that bad but it has become so incredibly bloated with features that I almost feel overwhelmed especially coming from stock Chrome or Firefox. Might just be me tho

path: 0 112496 113254, hotness: undefined, score: 16, children: 1
PancitCantot 9 points 3 years ago

I thought I wasn't the only one. Came from Chrome and Firefox, MS Edge seems overstuffed with news grids/headlines, Bing sidebar, MS "apps" etc. It is soooo unnecessary.

path: 0 112496 113254 113608, hotness: undefined, score: 9, children: 0
Scaldart 15 points 3 years ago

I'm one of those people. I hate Edge. Like, with a disproportionate amount of vitriol.

But it actually doesn't have anything to do with its functionality (though I'm not thrilled with the privacy concern OP linked), but rather the fact that I get bombarded with "IT'S BETTER IN EDGE! MAKE EDGE YOUR DEFAULT BROWSER! PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE!." It's the most asinine, annoying bullshit.

In all fairness, I did finally figure out how to make it stop. It's just ridiculous that I have to go through all of that every time I'm on a new PC. Let me browse the way I want to, damnit.

path: 0 112496 113310, hotness: undefined, score: 15, children: 0
FermatsLastAccount 11 points 3 years ago

I've been using it a bit since Bing chat came out (even though Edge on Linux should probably be like a crime) and it's pretty good. But this is a legitimate privacy concern that's deserving of hate.

path: 0 112496 114136, hotness: undefined, score: 11, children: 6
voynich 2 points 3 years ago

The concern about privacy is definitely valid, but I'm not as worried about that stuff as I care more that it works than anything else.

path: 0 112496 114136 114173, hotness: undefined, score: 2, children: 1
FermatsLastAccount 15 points 3 years ago

You're on privacy guide, so I think it's natural that people would be worried about privacy.

path: 0 112496 114136 114173 115885, hotness: undefined, score: 15, children: 0
fixmbr 2 points 3 years ago

You're also one of the 5 other people who use edge on Linux then. I'm forced to use it for work and have got too used to vertical tabs to use anything else. You can fix a lot of edges privacy issues via settings and launch options, though sometimes they'll end up turned back on due to an update. I have a love-hate relationship and won't hesitate to move back to Firefox.

path: 0 112496 114136 120616, hotness: undefined, score: 2, children: 3
fossilesque 1 point 3 years ago
path: 0 112496 114136 120616 163309, hotness: undefined, score: 1, children: 2
fixmbr 1 point 3 years ago

Brave is run by a homophobe unfortunately so I don't see myself ever using it.

path: 0 112496 114136 120616 163309 164030, hotness: undefined, score: 1, children: 1
Mihuy 7 points 3 years ago

Yeah, I was using Edge before I started caring about my privacy. It's literally the fastest chromium browser and has a bunch of cool features. But as @CheshireSnake said, privacy wise Edge isn't an option.

path: 0 112496 128186, hotness: undefined, score: 7, children: 1
LaunchesKayaks 1 point 3 years ago

I use edge at work only, where idgaf if they have info from that. It's literally just me looking shit up and accessing sites I need to do my job. My coworkers also use edge because it's faster than Chrome and all that.

path: 0 112496 128186 165573, hotness: undefined, score: 1, children: 0
TairikuOkami 5 points 3 years ago
path: 0 112496 181732, hotness: undefined, score: 5, children: 0
chika 12 points 3 years ago

Why are we trusting Microsoft for anything privacy related? Lol

path: 0 173663, hotness: undefined, score: 12, children: 0
WhoRoger 9 points 3 years ago

What do you expect from Microsoft, really?

path: 0 113364, hotness: undefined, score: 9, children: 0
SmugBedBug 8 points 3 years ago

My god! Being based on chromium and developed by Microsoft were already 2 reasons to stay away. Why would they feel the need to send viewed images back to Microsoft?

I wonder if this includes private images from iCloud/google photos.

path: 0 112329, hotness: undefined, score: 8, children: 1
pfannkuchen_gesicht 3 points 3 years ago

you might want to actually read the article

path: 0 112329 123951, hotness: undefined, score: 3, children: 0
darkknight 6 points 3 years ago

I've only ever used edge to download another browser or when on a clients server. Edge works ok, but I would never use it as my daily browser.

path: 0 117504, hotness: undefined, score: 6, children: 0
ndr 5 points 3 years ago

As long as that feature can be disabled, which also clearly states that it sends stuff to Microsoft, I don’t see the big problem. It shouldn’t come as a surprise that there are many features enabled by default of dubious privacy.

path: 0 126574, hotness: undefined, score: 5, children: 0
JustARegularNerd 3 points 3 years ago

I always use a combination of LibreWolf or Ungoogled Chromium for websites that don't work in LW, but my work insists we use and recommend Edge, their reason being that if a user has trouble in Edge we should know how to fix it, especially as it's the browser we should be recommending.

Good to know I need to be especially careful of what I view on Edge now though.. Yikes.

path: 0 123805, hotness: undefined, score: 3, children: 0
TairikuOkami 2 points 3 years ago
path: 0 181563, hotness: undefined, score: 2, children: 0
Eke 2 points 3 years ago

it doesn't make any difference because no one uses it anyway. am I right?

path: 0 716339, hotness: undefined, score: 2, children: 0
privacyguides
privacyguides

@lemmy.one

login for more options
18764
647
3

In the digital age, protecting your personal information might seem like an impossible task. We’re here to help.

This is a community for sharing news about privacy, posting information about cool privacy tools and services, and getting advice about your privacy journey.


You can subscribe to this community from any Kbin or Lemmy instance:

Learn more...


Check out our website at privacyguides.org before asking your questions here. We've tried answering the common questions and recommendations there!

Want to get involved? The website is open-source on GitHub, and your help would be appreciated!


This community is the "official" Privacy Guides community on Lemmy, which can be verified here. Other "Privacy Guides" communities on other Lemmy servers are not moderated by this team or associated with the website.


Moderation Rules:

  1. We prefer posting about open-source software whenever possible.
  2. This is not the place for self-promotion if you are not listed on privacyguides.org. If you want to be listed, make a suggestion on our forum first.
  3. No soliciting engagement: Don't ask for upvotes, follows, etc.
  4. Surveys, Fundraising, and Petitions must be pre-approved by the mod team.
  5. Be civil, no violence, hate speech. Assume people here are posting in good faith.
  6. Don't repost topics which have already been covered here.
  7. News posts must be related to privacy and security, and your post title must match the article headline exactly. Do not editorialize titles, you can post your opinions in the post body or a comment.
  8. Memes/images/video posts that could be summarized as text explanations should not be posted. Infographics and conference talks from reputable sources are acceptable.
  9. No help vampires: This is not a tech support subreddit, don't abuse our community's willingness to help. Questions related to privacy, security or privacy/security related software and their configurations are acceptable.
  10. No misinformation: Extraordinary claims must be matched with evidence.
  11. Do not post about VPNs or cryptocurrencies which are not listed on privacyguides.org. See Rule 2 for info on adding new recommendations to the website.
  12. General guides or software lists are not permitted. Original sources and research about specific topics are allowed as long as they are high quality and factual. We are not providing a platform for poorly-vetted, out-of-date or conflicting recommendations.

Additional Resources:

go to feed...