Hi! I just got a new computer recently, and I'm concerned about browser security and security in general. Any recommendations for a good secure browser? Preferably open source.
However privacy ≠ security, and I wouldn't trade all my privacy for it (also a non private browser shares more information with the actors you interact with by default, which means you have always more personal data to lose).
My recommendation for a secure and private everyday browser, both on mobile and desktop, is Brave. They check every box in privacytests.org and are built on top of chromium, which is (sadly) more secure than Firefox or any of its derivative (apart from tor, ofc).
Edit: if you don't have any particular threat model I'd suggest just go with firefox (or librewolf if you don't want to spend time hardening it https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F7-bW2y6lcI) from desktop and brave from mobile (I really don't like firefox mobile).
OP, go download Firefox and then go to https://stigviewer.com/stigs
And find Firefox. This will cover all known low level security controls. This will keep you from ever being vulnerable in the first place. Just follow the fix text for each control you care about and you're done.
While you're at it, go through the windows controls. Hope you know regedit.
Brave because it has great defaults out of the box, and it's Chromium, so all websites work as intended.
I wish I could recommend Firefox or LibreWolf, but their performance isn't nearly as good.
I really like using Brave. Seems to strike a good overall balance. It has some annoying things like the crypto crap, but luckily you can customize a lot of that so you don’t see it.
I personally go for firefox on desktop (with AdGuard/UBlock) and with Mull (Firefox based) on mobile with the same extensions (yes, you can add practically any extension to firefox mobile).
If you prefer a chromium based browser, brave is fine, even if I don't like some of their choices. An alternative on mobile is mulch - that is based on chromium and available on fdroid.
Both mull and mulch are part of a privacy oriented project. I like firefox on phones more than chromium based, while on tablets it struggles IMHO.
He overselled the extensions on mobile. There are a few of them and some are great (I couldn't live without Dark Reader), but there are about 30 extension total available.
I think it might be helpful for you and others if you elaborate a bit more on your threat models and your potential uses - is it for general browsing and work? Does your work encounter “insecure” content often?
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