
PirateBrowser - No more censorship - Brajeshwar
http://piratebrowser.com/
======
morphar
IMHO projects like this, should stop using the word "pirate". I think it is a
boundary for people, to emotionally (though subconsciously) having to be o.k.
with being seen (mostly by themselves) as "crooks".

You don't need to be doing something illegal, in order to want privacy...

Besides I think we should reverse the picture and make sure it is the secret
spying eyes, that are seen as "crooks".

It is not me being mischievous for wanting privacy - it is the governments for
not respecting my privacy.

The physical analogy of online spying, paint the right picture I think:
Someone plants several cameras and microphones around your house. They have
also someone following you around almost 24/7, to always know where you are.
Why? Because you might one day do something, that may or may not be dangerous
to between 1 and several thousand people - or at least talk to someone who
know someone, who knows...... This is, by the way, not just you - it has been
done to everyone on your street - oh... And the world...

I saw a film about the old east Germany and how they were spied on and thought
wow! They were really aggressive with the spying and surveillance... Till it
hit me: That was nothing compare to what is being done to virtually ALL
"citizens" of the internet!..

Wow... That became a rant... Sorry... The word "pirate" got me started! ;)

~~~
nova
> You don't need to be doing something illegal, in order to want privacy...

But due to the existence of general-purpose computers the only way of really
enforcing copyright law (meaning to stop the unauthorized transfer of
information) is by some kind of total surveillance cyber-policial state.

So yes, it's not the same, but they are related in practice.

General purpose computing isn't probably going away because of its economic
importance (but they sure can try with DRM schemes and such). Copyright law
isn't getting any better because they own the governments. Therefore...

~~~
morphar
I think it is interesting to see how many people will watch tv series, films
and other content illegally, when it's easier and how many actually pays, when
that's easier...

I can't remember numbers or sources, but just look at iTunes, hulu, netflix,
etc. sales... I think many of their customers have watched pirated DVDs and
streamed or downloaded from illegal sources, before they came around and
things easy.

It's weird how, some industries would rather spend millions hunting down
"pirates", instead of making access to their easy! ;)

~~~
DanBC
Some content is made lagally available for free in my country over video on
demand systems like BBC iplayer or channel 4 on demand.

The BBC app does not all someone to download a programme to watch later over
3g. It does allow streaming. (And i don't know what they're using to detect 3g
because you can download using a 3g dongle).

So, sometimes it's easier for me to just watch it on Youtube than it is to use
the official app.

It is frustrating that I try to do the right thing and they prevent me, and do
so for weird reasons.

~~~
morphar
Ha! Same in Denmark with DR (Danish national broadcasting station)...

HBO (I think) owns "Dexter" and I wanted to see the latest season, only to
discover they won't let iTunes sell it, till the season is over... What? Why?
Wh..? Do'oh!

So you won't let me pay you to watch it on a legal "channel"?... That is why
people watch it illegally!..

So many weird reasons...

------
greenyoda
" _Does this contain any viruses or trojans?

There have been no modifications to any of the packages used, no adware,
trojans, toolbars, etc. This is simply a tool to help people get around
censorship._"

I have no reason to believe that it contains any viruses, but if it did,
they'd obviously say the same thing.

~~~
midas007
The "captology" of the site doesn't convey enough reputation. CV's, history
and some support / contact details. Also an easy way to build from source.

The bigger issue is making build environments reproducible such that it's
possible to arrive the same binaries deterministically, and therefore proving
that there's nothing outside of the code. It's possible, but it's tricky,
especially with stack randomization and the other minutia of slightly
different configs. More apps like the opensuse build service, brew bot and
travis might help.

~~~
laurent123456
Also removing the affiliate link from the first question of the FAQ would help
make the project more credible. Right now, the whole thing looks like an ad
for something that actually provides better privacy (VPN).

~~~
midas007
Ugh, that's annoying. Fails the unwritten rule of "value first before
shamelessly plugging stuff."

------
teddyh
If you already have Tor Browser, you can just as well go directly to
[http://jntlesnev5o7zysa.onion/](http://jntlesnev5o7zysa.onion/) or
[http://uj3wazyk5u4hnvtk.onion/](http://uj3wazyk5u4hnvtk.onion/) (I’m not sure
which is the official one).

~~~
Dosenpfand
[http://jntlesnev5o7zysa.onion](http://jntlesnev5o7zysa.onion) seems to be the
official one, according to
[https://twitter.com/tpbdotorg/status/203221129513545729](https://twitter.com/tpbdotorg/status/203221129513545729)

~~~
teddyh
Yes, but:

1\. That tweet is from May 2012.

2\. The other URL is in the address bar in the screenshot on the Pirate
Browser web site. The screen shot has a time stamp of August 2013.

So the first URL was probably the official one in 2012, but it has possibly
been superseded by the other one.

------
eloff
It would be interesting if Firefox or chrome ever started to ship by default
with software capable of circumventing censorship. Probably they would just
get censored themselves.

~~~
alan_cx
Opera does. It has this "off road" mode, which does the same thing. Its
supposed to be some sort of caching for slow connection, but as the proxys, or
what ever, are outside the UK, all the banned sites work.

I am surprised Firefox and Chrome don't have plugins which do the same thing.

Also, YIFY torrents, amongst other things, hide behind Cloudflare. UK ISPs
cant block cloudflare. Well, they can, but the fallout would be somewhat
amusing.

Tangent:

What sickens me is that we in the UK bend over for the US film industry,
blocking sites the US will not ever block. IMHO, this is not just absurd but a
disgusting double standard our gov force on us in order to suck up to the US
gov. I can understand the US acting like it one rule for them, but the idea
that a foreign government volunteers its population to be sub the rest of the
human race angers me something rotten.

~~~
khc
I installed opera on my phone when I was visiting China, with unintended side
effect: Opera used a proxy in China even after I was no longer in China, as a
result I was subjected to GFW even when after I left[1]. Looks like they
decided which proxy to use at install time if you installed it in China[2].

Took me a while to figure out why certain sites were only failing in opera.

1:
[https://plus.google.com/+KaHingCheung/posts/AiyxGBjsHjo](https://plus.google.com/+KaHingCheung/posts/AiyxGBjsHjo)
2:
[https://plus.google.com/+KaHingCheung/posts/b12Xh2aAcEu](https://plus.google.com/+KaHingCheung/posts/b12Xh2aAcEu)

------
salient
This is about a year old I think. They're promising some big changes soon, or
it may be a completely different browser, since they're saying they'll be
using Webkit. They want to completely avoid domain name takedowns with it, by
using something like Namecoin:

[http://torrentfreak.com/how-the-pirate-bay-plans-to-beat-
cen...](http://torrentfreak.com/how-the-pirate-bay-plans-to-beat-censorship-
for-good-140105/)

~~~
GigabyteCoin
I am interested to learn more about this.

It seems thetorrentfreak isn't a very reputable news outlet, as they neglected
to list a single source in that entire article.

Are they personal friends with the pirate bay/browser guys or how did they
come across this information without anybody else reporting on the story?

------
danpalmer
I'm struggling to see what extra this gives a user over Tor. It appears to be
the Tor browser bundle, minus anonymously ty guarantees, but plus some links
to filesharing sites.

I'm all for additional methods to circumvent censorship, but Tor appears to be
a much better solution to this, and it doesn't carry with it the negative
connotations of piracy.

------
m-app
> "This is how it looks like."

I seem to come across an increasing number of occurrences of the phrase 'how
it looks like' (and derivatives). This, to me, sounds very wrong and is
starting to annoy me more than I'd like... But since it seems to become more
widespread, maybe it's me? (non-native English speaker, btw)

~~~
riffraff
would you prefer "this is how it looks" ?

I'm actually asking because I don't know, not being a native speaker either. I
just picked up the "looks like" idiom and assumed it was en_us considered ok
(like "long time no see" or using "egregious" to mean the opposite of the
original meaning)

~~~
rowyourboat
Yeah... "This is how it looks" or "this is what it looks like" are logically
consistent. "This is how it looks like"? It looks like how?

~~~
riffraff
ah makes sense, thanks!

------
atmosx
What is the difference between this and Tor's bundle and why should we use
this browser over the official one?

~~~
nwh
Less secure circuit construction makes it weaker for anonymity protection, but
drastically faster.

As the website states, don't rely on this for anything but downloading your
favourite linux distros behind a censored connection.

~~~
phaed
What is the advantage of speed given the size of torrent files?

~~~
wyager
TPB no longer uses torrent files as their primary distribution mechanism.
Torrent files were already small, but now they use magnet links which are
basically just a SHA1 hash and a URL for a tracker. The tracker isn't strictly
necessary.

Here's a fun trick: Make a plaintext file containing "Hello world" (maybe
lowercase, maybe either will work). Take its SHA1 hash. Paste that into the
Transmission "Open torrent address" dialog (edit: It looks like you can only
directly paste hashes into the web dialog. You can still craft a magnet link
manually). Give it like 5-10 minutes. Through the magic of DHT, you will soon
have a brand new copy of the "Hello World" text in your downloads directory.

------
joebo
Censorship in this context appears to be bypassing blocks on pirating
software, movies, etc. The screenshot shows the web page title of "Download
music, movies, games, and software." The toolbar buttons are for piracy
related sites. The name of the product is even PirateBrowser.

Censorship to me has a different meaning. _Censorship is the suppression of
speech or other public communication which may be considered objectionable,
harmful, sensitive, politically incorrect or inconvenient as determined by a
government, media outlet or other controlling body_ [1]

[1]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorship](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorship)

~~~
expr--
Nope. Censorship in this context means denying access to certain host names
from all people (in certain countries), regardless of what they would've done
had they been able to access the host name. (This procedure could be rephrased
as suppression of public communication which is considered objectionable,
harmful and inconvenient.) The following is irrelevant, but I'm quite sure The
Pirate Bay has links to liberally licensed music, as well as movies, games and
other software.

Circumventing the censorship has the usual meaning, i.e. allowing this said
access once again.

------
user24
My #1 question was: Who made this, and why should I trust them?

~~~
jpwagner
[http://whois.domaintools.com/piratebrowser.com](http://whois.domaintools.com/piratebrowser.com)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fredrik_Neij](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fredrik_Neij)

~~~
user24
I'm not sure that "make the user do a whois and then a wiki search" is a
reasonable UI flow. Even now, that whois info could be false and this could be
an elaborate spoof.

------
aabalkan
Windows-only. :(

~~~
vidyesh
Why not just use the Tor Browser Bundle?

[http://www.torproject.org.in/projects/torbrowser.html.en](http://www.torproject.org.in/projects/torbrowser.html.en)

------
pikachu_is_cool
Where's the source code?

------
tijs
The obvious goal of this project is to be able to browse torrent sites even if
your country blocks those... The "No more censorship" headline seems to give
people the impression that this is some kind of privacy tool which (as stated
in the FAQ) is not the intention.

~~~
sp332
Censorship and privacy are not the same issues. Also, the Sky filter that
blocks porn and pirate websites also block political websites.

------
4lun
Isn't this just the Tor Browser bundle with a couple of bookmarks?

------
colinbartlett
"Iran, North Korea, United Kingdom"... a certainly very intentional
juxtaposition of those country names there. Certainly makes you think.

~~~
adrianmalacoda
North Korea is an interesting choice, because its citizens do not even have
internet connectivity [1]. What they have is a North Korean national intranet
which is tightly controlled [2]. I don't believe Tor would be useful for
circumventing this.

[1] [http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/north-koreas-internet-
what...](http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/north-koreas-internet-what-
internet-most-online-access-doesnt-exist-1C9143426)

[2]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kwangmyong_(network)](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kwangmyong_\(network\))

------
chalgo
Or just setup your browser/network connection to use a free web proxy in a
non-blocking country that can easily be found on Google.

------
Aoyagi
Another project endorsing privacy and not listing any reasons and/or examples
why privacy is a good thing. I have yet to find one.

~~~
Raphmedia
A reason why privacy is a good thing? Have you been living under a rock?

~~~
Aoyagi
No, actually. Unlike you, I have been talking about the issue with people.
People that aren't very tech savvy too. A lot of them will comment with "I
have nothing to hide," or just "I don't care, it doesn't concern me," or even
"it's a good thing" and most of them give more credibility to what's written
online than to a single person explaining them various reasons how that system
can be abused.

That's why I feel pro-privacy projects should explain why privacy is good.
Because a lot of people don't seem to realize that. Kind of like you didn't
realize that it's not me who needs a well-worded explanation (though I would
surely spread it).

~~~
Raphmedia
Not quite unlike me. ;)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6201175](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6201175)

------
shacharz
Kept popping an error message saying: "firefox is already running", although
no process of firefox was running.

~~~
Pitarou
I've had similar problems with Tor Browser when it has trouble getting the Tor
connection set up.

Maybe you're behind a proxy, or maybe Tor traffic is being blocked?

~~~
phaed
Get the same problem stated above with PirateBrowser, yet the Tor Browser
Bundle works beautifully for me.

------
neeee
The source code doesn't seem to be availible anywhere. Is this a violation of
Firefox' license?

------
imwhimsical
This website is blocked in UAE, from where I'm at.

------
wnevets
isnt this how the FBI was able "break" TOR? They exploited an older version of
Firefox that came bundled with TOR.

