Microsoft is working on browsers for more privacy

"RePriv" lets users decide for themselves about data transfer

When it comes to their own privacy on the Internet, users are becoming more and more cautious. In the fight against unpleasant data spies, the browser is also increasingly becoming the focus of interest.

Microsoft has also recognized this trend: developers of in-house Research department  are already working flat out on a new type of browser software called "RePriv", which could bring about a significant improvement in the protection of users' privacy. These should be given the opportunity to determine at any time which information is passed on to third parties and which not.

"The browser knows more about user behavior than any individual website," said Microsoft researcher Ben Livshits to the US industry portal Technology Review. This fact results mainly from the fact that users give up part of their privacy in favor of personalizing web services. "RePriv also forwards some user data to third parties. In contrast to other browsers, however, the user himself takes control here," emphasizes Livshits.

User can decide

In practice, the software works as follows: The RePriv browser records the specific user behavior in order to create a list of his most popular online activities and topics. The collected data is saved locally. As soon as a website is visited that offers personalization options, a pop-up window appears that gives an overview of the information that should be requested from the user for this purpose. The latter can then decide in individual cases whether or not to pass on the requested data to the third party provider.

However the user decides at this point, the visited website will in no case have access to all of the information about his surfing behavior. Even if he agrees to a transfer, only the personal interests that are necessary for a personalization of the corresponding web offer are visible.

Demonstration with the New York Times website

In order to prove that the new browser system does its job in practice, Livshits and his team created a demonstration based on the New York Times website. "News portals could use RePriv to enable visitors to personalize the front page of their presence," the Microsoft researcher is convinced. The software then completely reorganizes the structure of the newspaper page according to the respective user interests and also includes data that has been collected via social networks such as Digg.

 

Source: paste

27.04.2011/XNUMX/XNUMX (mh)