Brave browser blocks Windows feature that takes screenshots of everything you do on your PC

This still doesn't make brave a good privacy browser in the long run

The founder of Brave browser got fired from Firefox because he was homophobic

yeah but it's run by an active opponent of LGBT folks

https://www.spacebar.news/stop-using-brave-browser/

BUT... most people really don't care about that, they just want to remove ads from facebook or youtube or whatever...
\ My clients couldn't care less about what the CEO does, heck they still think facebook is the dogs danglies and youtube is cutting edge plus Netflix is the best streaming service.
\ Fighting that is way harder than then trying to explain that some software is worse than others. Heck plenty still use Photoshop because they don't understand that alternatives exist and "everyone at work uses it"

Let me know when it is discovered that they in fact replaced MS Recall with their own version that was scraping your data in yet another sketchy attempt to make money.

Literally nothing will get me to use this crypto scam of a browser.

I've used this for years and have never interacted with any crypto feature
- That you know of
- Not interacted doesnt mean it's non-existant.
  It exists and therefore it's bad enough.
- They kind of just ignore that the crypto feature is opt-in.
- It's okay, it's never too late to switch.

Now whilst I enjoy all the comments I actually have to add something quickly that explains why this kind of thing happens. I recently worked with a rather old lady to find out why she was having so many issues with technology and stuff. I found out that when she started work in 1986 she was told that the shared password in her department at the local hospital was "password" and so she has used that on everything she can since to remember it... other gems that they used on whole departments included "qwerty" and "123456" and the best one of all "letmeinnow". On whole shared networks of 100+ machines...

Brave browser blocks Windows feature that takes screenshots of everything you do on your PC

As does Linux.

You use Linux? Here take this you've earned it 🍪
- What if they always decline cookies? Or is this cookie one of those necessary ones?
OK, you need to explain to me how tf does Linux block something that works only on Windows.
- No Windows, no such Windows "features".

I used some stuff to block my location and windows recall BECAUSE FUCK YOU MICROSOFT!

You can’t block all of Windows spyware. The best case of action would be to install an alternative operating system like Linux or a BSD-derivative. It’s counter-intuitive to “fuck Microsoft” when you are still using their OS.
- I wonder why the fuck is am taking so long to do it...
there are 100% fed backdoors for looking in your pc in Windows

yeah, no, i'm not using your shitty browser.

But it’s funded by an unrepentant homophobe! How can you pass on that?!
It's probably the best chromium browser out there
Firefox has done shit too
sadly we don't have a lot of choice, but they're one of the least worse
- Firefox has done shit too
  Firefox has injected my URLs with affiliate codes?
- Just don't use Chromium unless you for some reason absolutely have to. Mozilla is just another corporation, but they're not exactly threatening to monopolise the internet. Google is, and using Chromium directly aids in their effort to do so.
- sure there are choices. I don't use either. if you believe there are only 2 choices out there...man you have no idea.

Unfortunately that would involve using the Brave browser, which is an antifeature in itself.

Can you elaborate? I don’t use it.
- They shit on it because just like Mozilla, they made some shit decision by making some shady partnerships, and because the CEO is transphobic/homophobic/can't remember
  Apart from the usual bullshit and antifeatures it has, it's still a great browser choice, just like Firefox

Running Linux would block this feature too.

Just reason sayin.

Switching to Linux made me like computers again. Switching to Hyprland made me love computers again.
- Switching to TempleOS made me hear the voices again.
- Same story here! Im in love with computing all over again because of it. Too bad many are tricked into thinking Microsoft ia the only option.
- Hyprland made me suicidal again but we are all different
There's one in every thread.
- There are dozens of us! Dozens!
- One?
Running Linux would block this feature too.
Keep In mind that you can still be captured by this feature indirectly, ~~Discord for example certainly doesn’t intend to do anything to hide your messages, they recently went public so in their eyes more tracking the better.~~
I’m thankful to have made a feature request to Element/Matrix asking for them to prevent this exact thing.
- Discord... Still isn't public?
  They're certainly talking about it but they haven't announced a date yet.
  Having said that, element and matrix are both more privacy respecting so I do agree with the recommendation in general.
Actually, Linux doesn't block windows, it just isn't windows.
Just reason saying.
- Actually it does! When youre installing, just delete the windows boot partition and your done!
Tbf, anything that isn't AI Windows blocks the feature. Including regular Windows.
People just need to not fall for the scam edition and they don't have to deal with this shit.

Linux blocks that "feature" too...

What feature? Recall?? That's Windows 11-specific and hasn't even launched yet??
- The joke is that Linux blocks this by not doing it at all. Which is why people should switch to Linux. Which is a good idea. But that's up to the people.
- I love this comment so much

They haven't blocked the windows feature, they're using DRM to interfere with it. Microsoft could easily change how the DRM works any time they want, rendering all these hacks useless.

Exactly, how do you even fight with the OS except just making it bit hard for them lol. You have to tell the OS what pixels to put in the screen, there's literally no way you can hide things from the OS if they want to know.
People, ynless they are at work, can choose to use Linux any time. I will personally assist if needed.
then people can complained it on Brave Github or their official forum and it will be fixed by their team
- My point was that brave's solution, like Signal's, is dependent on microsoft playing fair. If microsoft decides they don't want brave, signal, or anyone else using DRM to interfere with their screen scraping chatbot, there is not going to be an easy way to fix it.
They could, but Disney..

In this thread something I see a lot on lemmy is happening. Maybe someone can give me a hint on how that happens. The post itself is 90% upvotes, while the comment section is really anti-Brave (for good reasons). Do most upvotes come from people scrolling through without looking at the comment section and those with an opinion on the topic dive into it?

I upvote the post because I support the feature, and would like to see more browsers implement more privacy focused features.
I upvote the anti-Brave comments, because fuck Brave.
The post itself is reasonable quality and informative so I find it upvote worthy. If a post is low quality or a shit post then I downvote.
To me the karma system is about quality. Not an "I agree/disagree" button.
For comments I only down vote obvious trolls, bigots/racism etc.
- To me the karma system is about quality. Not an “I agree/disagree” button.
  That's how it was meant to be. The original Rediquette from over 15 years ago has:
  "Vote. If you think something contributes to conversation, upvote it. If you think it does not contribute to the subreddit it is posted in or is off-topic in a particular community, downvote it.
  [Please don't] Downvote an otherwise acceptable post because you don't personally like it. Think before you downvote and take a moment to ensure you're downvoting someone because they are not contributing to the community dialogue or discussion. If you simply take a moment to stop, think and examine your reasons for downvoting, rather than doing so out of an emotional reaction, you will ensure that your downvotes are given for good reasons."
  But 99% of people definitely use them as an Agree/Disagree button.
- Well, one could argue if just posting a link with a title is a 'quality' post. But the topic is still worth a discussion so I don't see why it should be downvoted.
- The problem is that people routinely upvote bullshit, falsehoods, and flat out disinformation. Just because it was well written does not make it true.
I think you should not downvote a post you have a negative opinion about. If the post is worth to discuss then why should I not upvote the post and then say that I disagree in the comments. If we all down vote those posts nobody will see it (apart of those who sort by controversial) and there will be no discussion.
- If the software in question is bad, then I'd like to reduce visibility of the post while explaining why in the comments.
  Brave is connected to the BAT pay-to-surf scam. Its CEO donates to homophobic causes.
Most people never bother to read anything beyond the title of the post. Let alone click the link to the article.
Now, i don't know how everyone sees up/down votes. But I always thought that content and comments that is relevant and promotes discussion is good. And comments that aren't are bad.
Rather than a measure of others opinions.
I’ve noticed this on political posts too, among others and I’ve wondered the same thing.
- I upvote posts that I think are worth being seen by more people. That includes posts about topics that I don’t like or agree with, but think people need to know is happening and I think to know that are not including disinformation or misinformation or opinion written as facts.
people just scroll around up voting headlines that they think sound good or support their identity
I try to counter this by randomly downvoting everything

Brave 🤮

Windows 🤮
- "feature" 🤮
I mean Mozilla's Firefox is 🤮 too... there's no perfect browser
- nothing is perfect, except the horseshoe crab. however both librewolf and cromite are great with ublock, and ltsc windows has no copilot since companies use that edition.

anarcho-......braveism ???

Sometimes bad people do good things.

I would not call brave good..

Just avoid using an “AI” cpu.

"Feature"

All I have to say is I hope this catches on with other browsers.

A device that surreptitiously gathers information on a target is called a bug, not a feature.

More like malware
- yup. how do people continue using Winblows :/
~~Well, not really, a bug is unintentional. Even calling it a design flaw is a stretch, it's a feature that isn't for your benefit.~~
- "Bug" also means "listening device."
So, you're saying that browsing history, in literally any browser on the market, is a bug not a feature?
surreptitiously
Oh, wait, I actually missed that! How is something that you need to purposefully turn on "surreptitious"? Like... Holy fuck, people, this is supposed to be the community of tech-literate people, so maybe stop fear-mongering in read about Recall a bit? It's opt-in, it's limited to a (as of now) extremely small number of NPU-carrying devices, it's offline.
If you don't like it, just don't fucking turn it on.
- It's a good thing that microsoft is trustworthy and you can believe everything they say. And that malware never misuses resources of the system on which it is installed.

Simplewall allows direct control of internet access of any program and app; you can block CoPilot from accessing the internet.

I still have literally thousands of clients that use Windows and want support... for these kinds of things. Firefox has recently stopped working on a few things and Brave works better for me right now. It's not convenience when FF doesn't work...
\ But I digress, Win 11 here and Brave. My choices, for lots of reasons. Lots of linux boxes as well though. Each to their own and all that

This is about the Smart App Control feature in Win11 that takes screenshots periodically to check for "malicious activity". its basically a glorified keylogger built into the OS. Firefox should really follow suit and block this too.

Holy shit, what a comment!
This is about the Smart App Control
It's not, it's about Recall.
that takes screenshots periodically to check for “malicious activity”
It doesn't. Smar App Control does code validation and reputation check. Recall makes screenshots, OCR's them and keeps them in an encrypted vault for the user to interact with.
built into the OS
It's not, you can turn both off at any time.
its basically a glorified keylogger
It's not, it fundamentally is NOT, because it doesn't log any keystrokes. SAC isn't even in the picture here, while Recall literally only makes screenshots, runs OCR and encrypts that.
Fuck me, where do you people get this bullshit from? It used to be "oh no, Microsoft will be making screenshots of your activity and sending them to their servers" not so long ago which, while still bullshit, was at least in the same ballpark as what Recall does.
Now you're throwing SAC into the mix somehow?
- I worry that the prevalence of ill-informed hot-takes dilutes the validity of complaints, and I appreciate your work here

The sad thing is that you now have to protect yourself against the OS you are using. Feels a bit like in the movie TRON.

I don't, my OS doesn't come with any nonsense.
- Me neither, I just watch the shit show from the bleachers.

What a title. Made me think installing the browser blocked the feature machine-wide.

Oh so they're just doing whatever Firefox is doing in private mode on Android that makes screenshots all black

Can Recall not just be turned off?

For an update or two, at least. Windows features tend to get turned back on after updates quite frequently.
- I'm probably going to have to move to 11 at some point (Linux isn't for me right now), but I would like to be able to disable as much bloatware as possible. Vigilance it is then.
- That's why you leverage group policy or local security policies to disable these features.
For now it is opt-in. It's unlikely to remain that way.
- Also it's not like windows doesn't routinely "forgets" these settings with updates. Or harasses you to opt in again with every update, in the hopes that one day you'll let it slip
Yes.
When they rolled out the update that removed the toggle for it, I remember seeing steps for how to disable it via regedit or tools which would do that for you, all with the warnings of future updates may re-enable it.
I haven’t moved from W10 yet so I’m kinda ootl on it, but that’s what I remember

People are still using Windows!?

People are still using the os that has like 95% market penetration? Yeah man pretty sure
- 70% but yeh.
  https://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-share/desktop/worldwide/
Until Macs become cheaper or Linux becomes easier, Windows will remain the largest OS.
- I would rather be set on fire and have it put out with shovel than use a mac.
- What's easier in Windows compared to Linux? Except the fact that you have to install it, since it doesn't come preinstalled on as many PCs. But many people who think Windows is easy would probably still consider installing it difficult.
Plenty of people still use it for work
- Any workplace with halfway decent IT will disable it by default.
  Which may be about 50% of workplaces, but still.
Games
- I've been gamin on Linux for over a year with 0 issues, the only games that should be keeping people back are a small handful of competitive games with certain types of anticheat. (Most anticheat does work on Linux)
- Aside from anticheat BS, Linux has come pretty far. It's not perfect, but it's not the frustrating mess like it used to be half a decade ago.

Very brave of them.

This isn't unique to Brave.

for browser this is the first time tbh
What other browsers are implementing this? It's the first I've heard of it.

You might say that they are being so very... Brave.

🎤 tap tap ... is this thing on?

funny thing is ban evaders(the ones that make hundreds of accounts for OF or links) use it for its anti-fingerprinting which is useful against reddit(temporarily) ability to read the browser. i used to temporarily, and kinda explains why my last acc was only shadowbanned much later than thier purges.(i was hit by thier AI moderation as soon as switched to a different browser fork of FF)

it has better anti fingerprinting than firefox? That's nice to know
- oh yea i used pixel scan or something similar, ban evaders use these to check thier browser profile, and it partially shields it. there other similar browser scanners, but the thing is you also need proxies and anti-detect browsers to hide the rest of your activities, because reddit is just that invasive in detection.(hence all those bans.