PSA: Tor/Mullvad Browsers update issue

Privacy
1

Hopefully it isn’t universal. But when my Mullvad Browser updated to 13 the “delete cookies and site data when Mullvad Browser is closed” toggle got unchecked.

So pay attention to that!

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2

MB uses always-on private browsing mode by default. Not sure if this option is actually needed. Did you try with a new profile without changing any settings, to see if any site data persists after closing? It should not.

3

Well I noticed it because my libreddit settings were being carried over to the next session, even after system restarts, so it does make a difference somehow. Which is funny, because on 12.x, as expected, activating/deactivating that toggle changed nothing for me.

It happened in two different profiles, but on the same computer, so a limited sample.

4

Libreddit is an extension I reckon. How extensions store data is unrelated to the “cookies and site data” setting in Firefox-based browsers. There is actually no way to delete extension data automatically as to my knowledge. And as far as I know, MB 12.x and 13.x do not differ in their behavior when it comes to this. But would be interesting if they did.

5

I cannot replicate this on my end. (Mullvad Browser 13.0.1 installed via this method)

What I did:

  1. I opened a new Mullvad Browser (MB) window
  2. Went to Libreddit Settings
  3. Changed one of its default settings by ticking off “Use HLS for videos” and clicking the ‘Save’ button
  4. Navigated to a Reddit post with an embedded video to make sure that my change to the HLS setting went through
  5. Closed this window
  6. Repeated steps 1 and 2

The result is that the Libreddit setting I changed in step 3 reverted to the default value (i.e., HLS on) in the new window.

How did you install MB? What was the method through which the browser was updated?

6

You’re probably thinking of LibRedirect. I was talking about LibReddit, the Reddit front end.

7

Maybe I’ll uninstall MB and reinstall it again.

Yes, I downloaded the dmg and dragged it to the apps icon. Updates are done by the browser itself.

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8

On a native package?
Not an issue on flatpak version 13.0.1