This browser lets you know who is tracking you

Though people are adamant on Mozilla’s Firefox browser being not as fast as Google’s Chrome, it’s user base has been stuck to the browser for the extra tweaks, customisation and privacy control that it offers. Now the latest update of the web browser even lets users know when they are being tracked while surfing.

The browser will now stop trackers by default on both Windows and MacOS. These trackers cling to your browser and follow you as you hop sites, bringing those “relevant ads” with them. There are even cryptominers who use your device’s resources to mine cryptocurrency and fingerprinters that identify users by analysing their devices, apps and settings.

Firefox has been doing this for quite a while now but the work was always behind closed doors. Now, the recent update gives users a detailed report to help them understand who is trying to track them in real-time.

How to do this?

Here’s how you can enable the latest Firefox (version 70) to do this:

When on any website, Firefox will display a shield on the Address bar. If the shield is grey, it means that Firefox is not blocking anything on the site. If blue, it means there are trackers being blocked.

If the shield indeed is blue, head over to the “Blocked” area and click on the corresponding labels to see what’s being blocked.

Below, tapping the Protection Settings will help you configure the settings, and at the extreme bottom, a “show report” button will display a day-to-day report of the blocked trackers.