Hello everyone,
I’m currently using Mullvad browser for web browsing without logging in to my accounts and Brave to login to my personal accounts.
Lately, I’ve been thinking to replace Brave and use Firefox for my personal accounts.
So, If I configure Firefox as recommended in the PG guide without Hardening, will it be equal to Brave in terms of privacy ?
So, If I configure Firefox as recommended in the PG guide without Hardening, will it be equal to Brave in terms of privacy ?
Unfortunately, no.
Brave is designed with privacy as a core feature, integrating advanced tracking protection and ad-blocking capabilities by default. This is achieved through built-in mechanisms such as Shields, which block third-party trackers, ads, and fingerprinting techniques without requiring extensive user configuration.
Firefox can only achieve similar functionality through extensions (e.g., uBlock Origin) and configuration changes (user.js), which require active user intervention (hardening).
First of, I think it is a good idea to keep a chromium browser in your drawer, if you dislike Brave (like me) for some reason, you can get Cromite instead.
If your threat model does not include physical attack (I think most people don’t) then using PWA for your sites (if offered) with 1 profile / site is quite good. Firefox does not support PWA.
If you want Gecko browsers only, then you can consider Librewolf (though not being recommended by PG) using multiple containers.
Just for your information, I use
Librewolf portable - primary browser (might switch back to installed version but need to find out profile storage location first)
Mullvad - random browsing
Cromite portable - PWA
Firefox - compatibility fallback
Please learn to make choices yourself. IMO You shouldn’t rely on strangers to micro-manage your privacy decisions.
The journey to living in the woods with carrier pigeons begins with simple questions like OP.
Firefox also blocks trackers, it just doesn’t block ads ootb. Firefox also has nice fingerprint randomization features and lots of other cool stuff going on to protect your privacy all from settings exposed in the UI. I’m not sure if it’s possible to directly compare two browsers since there’s so many factors at play but Firefox implements a lot of useful privacy features just like brave does.
What a ridiculous thing to say on a help forum specifically about privacy.
Unfortunately, no.
I think you’ve misunderstood an important part of OP’s question, specifically:
So, If I configure Firefox as recommended in the PG guide
Both Brave and Firefox require a bit of modification out of the box, I think Brave’s defaults are slightly better in some ways, but neither is highly locked down ootb. Both can be improved with just a handful of tweaks to GUI settings. Going further (e.g. Arkenfox) is optional.
If you setup either Firefox or Brave per PG’s reccomendations, you’ll have:
Off the top of my head, I can’t think of any big substantive privacy differences between the two, if configured per PG’s recommendations.
Brave’s defaults are a little bit better in some real ways, especially for a somewhat less technical userbase. But neither Brave nor Firefox are optimal ootb. And the privacy protections seem fairly comparable if you follow PG recc’s for both browsers (though I do agree with @anon66791365 that browsers are kind of too complex and multifaceted for simple feature by feature comparisons to be very accurate.
I personally feel that marginal differences in defaults do matter but are not super consequential in the context of FF/Brave since we are recommending at least some modifications to the defaults for both browsers. Whether a user has to change 10 settings or 15 settings, isn’t hugely consequential. For both browsers its a one time task that can be done from the GUI and takes at most ~5-10 minutes to configure.