Mullvad Browser's fingerprint is different than Tor Browser's

In fact, Mullvad Browser doesn’t provide the same fingerprinting protection as TOR browser.

From github*

User comment : Yes, because for starters they have enabled webRTC and media devices. Mullvad : Currently, the NoScript configuration is slightly different from Tor’s; Cross-tab Identity Leak Protection is disabled by default

*Mullvad Browser's fingerprint is different from Tor Browser · Issue #18 · mullvad/mullvad-browser · GitHub

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That’s correct, it isn’t meant to. It should only have the same fingerprint as other Mullvad Browser installs.

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You might want to modify the description which says “Mullvad Browser is a version of Tor Browser with Tor network integrations removed, aimed at providing Tor Browser’s anti-fingerprinting browser technologies to VPN user”

Interesting, that statement is correct, but I can see how you could interpret it as meaning it’s identical to Tor’s fingerprint. In reality it could never match Tor Browser no matter what the browser did simply because Mullvad Browser would never be connecting to websites via Tor exit nodes, but that isn’t necessarily self-explanatory for people who aren’t familiar with browser fingerprinting.

approved - I’ll work on a PR to clean up that description :+1:

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I’m not a pro, but I understand, that Mullvad, LibreWolf or a hardened FireFox are browsers with good privacy. So I installed all of them incl. the Proton Pass and SimpleLogin extension. Also, I hardened Firefox.

When I tested the browsers with EFF’s Cover Your Track, I have got the following results.

LIBREWOLF 122.0-2

  • Blocking tracking ads: YES
  • Blocking invisible trackers: YES
  • Protecting fingerprinting: NEARLY

MULLVAD 13.0.9

  • Blocking tracking ads: PARTIAL PROTECTION
  • Blocking invisible trackers: PARTIAL PROTECTION
  • Protecting fingerprinting: UNIQUE

FIREFOX 122.0

  • Blocking tracking ads: YES
  • Blocking invisible trackers: YES
  • Protecting fingerprinting: UNIQUE

When I tested with Proton VPN, I’ve got the same results for all of them.

  • Blocking tracking ads: YES
  • Blocking invisible trackers: YES
  • Protecting fingerprinting: UNIQUE

I’m not a pro, so I’m not sure how to interpret this results. But from all the chat I thought Mullvad is the most private one. After my tests, however, it looks like it’s LibreWolf.
I dislike to have many apps on my devices. Simplicity is complex, I know. But I guess I have to choose LibreWolf in this case. Even I like Sweden (Mullvad) and Switzerland (Proton) :wink:

Well, first Cover your tracks is not a good tool to evaluate fingerprinting because of his statistics based on a reduced pool of users.

The way Tor and Mullvad browsers help with fingerprint is not by avoid it (which is actually impossible) but to blend in a crowd of the same fingerprint.

There are quite a widespread misconceptions on fingerprint and I think that would be nice to address this in the knowledge base.

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I understand. So a unique fingerprint isn’t that bad when testing Mullvad with EFF. But how about blocking tracking ads and blocking invisible yes? Both results are ‘Partial Protection’. LibreWolf and FireFox are protecting as per test results.

Then pls don’t. Fingerprinting test sites like Coveryourtracks can lead to wrong decisions for many reasons and their way of gathering statistical values is fundamentally flawed. It’s a problem that they don’t show a warning about this.

I get the urge of people to test their browser setup and help with their decision, especially considering the many different recommendations on privacy websites. And I don’t blame them for using these sites, but it’s just exhausting to educate people about the massive shortcomings of these test sites again and again. Coveryourtracks really did more harm than good by not making these clear to the users. It won’t give you a meaningful result about how easy you can be tracked through fingerprinting. And even if it did, it’s just one part of browser privacy and security.

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