Privoxy 3.0.7 User Manual
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Privoxy 3.0.30 User Manual
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3. What's New in this Release

Privoxy 3.0.29 fixes a couple of memory leaks and introduces https inspection + which allows to filter encrypted requests and responses.

Changes in Privoxy 3.0.29 stable:

+
Security/Reliability:
+
- +
  Fixed memory leaks when a response is buffered and the buffer limit is reached or Privoxy is running out + of memory. Commits bbd53f1010b and 4490d451f9b. OVE-20201118-0001. Sponsored by: Robert Klemme
  +
- +
  Fixed a memory leak in the show-status CGI handler when no action files are configured. Commit + c62254a686. OVE-20201118-0002. Sponsored by: Robert Klemme
  +
- +
  Fixed a memory leak in the show-status CGI handler when no filter files are configured. Commit + 1b1370f7a8a. OVE-20201118-0003. Sponsored by: Robert Klemme
  +
- +
  Fixes a memory leak when client tags are active. Commit 245e1cf32. OVE-20201118-0004. Sponsored by: + Robert Klemme
  +
- +
  Fixed a memory leak if multiple filters are executed and the last one is skipped due to a pcre error. + Commit 5cfb7bc8fe. OVE-20201118-0005.
  +
- +
  Prevent an unlikely dereference of a NULL-pointer that could result in a crash if + accept-intercepted-requests was enabled, Privoxy failed to get the request destination from the Host header + and a memory allocation failed. Commit 7530132349. CID 267165. OVE-20201118-0006.
  +
- +
  Fixed memory leaks in the client-tags CGI handler when client tags are configured and memory allocations + fail. Commit cf5640eb2a. CID 267168. OVE-20201118-0007.
  +
- +
  Fixed memory leaks in the show-status CGI handler when memory allocations fail. Commit 064eac5fd0 and + commit fdee85c0bf3. CID 305233. OVE-20201118-0008.
  +
+
+
General improvements:
+
- +
  Added experimental https inspection support which allows to filter https traffic. To enable it, install + MbedTLS and configure with --with-mbedtls, or install OpenSSL or LibreSSL and configure with + --with-openssl. Afterwards configure the directives in section 7 of the config file and enable the + +https-inspection action. Initial MbedTLS-based code contributed by Vaclav Svec, initial OpenSSL support + contributed by Maxim Antonov. With help from Nedzad Hrnjica and Ho+ Ho+ Ho+. Integration and improvements + sponsored by Robert Klemme.
  +
- +
  pcrs: Request JIT compilation if it's supported and the filter isn't dynamic. This can speed up + filtering.
  +
- +
  Added support for Brotli decompression. Sponsored by: Robert Klemme
  +
- +
  Added FEATURE_EXTENDED_STATISTICS to gather statistics for block reasons and filter executions. To + enable it, configure with --enable-extended-statistics and visit http://config.privoxy.org/show-status. + Sponsored by: Robert Klemme
  +
- +
  Use the IP_FREEBIND socket option, if defined. This allows Privoxy to bind to not-yet assigned IP + addresses which is useful in failover environments. Patch by Sam Varshavchik.
  +
- +
  Allow to use extended host patterns and vanilla host patterns at the same time by prefixing extended + host patterns with "PCRE-HOST-PATTERN:". To enable this, configure with --enable-pcre-host-patterns. + Sponsored by: Robert Klemme
  +
- +
  Added "Cross-origin resource sharing" (CORS) support. This allows to access Privoxy's CGI interface via + JavaScript from another domain (white-listed with the new cors-allowed-origin directive). Based on a patch + by Nedzad Hrnjica. Sponsored by: Robert Klemme.
  +
- +
  Add SOCKS5 username/password support. Based on a patch by Sam, improved by Ivan Romanov. Closes + Patch#141 and solves TODO#105.
  +
- +
  Bump the maximum number of action and filter files to 100 each. Sponsored by: Robert Klemme
  +
- +
  Fixed handling of filters with "split-large-forms 1" when using the CGI editor. Reported by withoutname + in #921.
  +
- +
  Better detect a mismatch of connection details when figuring out whether or not a connection can be + reused.
  +
- +
  Don't send a "Connection failure" message instead of the "DNS failure" message. Sponsored by: Robert + Klemme
  +
- +
  Let LOG_LEVEL_REQUEST log all requests. Previously unencrypted requests were only logged with + LOG_LEVEL_REQUEST when they weren't crunched (in which case they were logged with LOG_LEVEL_CRUNCH). This + was documented behaviour, but logging all requests seems more useful.
  +
- +
  Fixed locking around localtime() and gmtime().
  +
- +
  Removed OS/2 support. We haven't provided OS/2 packages in years, it complicated the code and it + depended on a fallback snprintf() implementation which is GPLv2 only.
  +
- +
  Remove the fallback snprintf() implementation Now that OS/2 support is gone we no longer need it.
  +
- +
  Fixed a bunch of format specifiers log messages.
  +
- +
  Added a missing apostrophe in the 'More Privoxy' menu.
  +
- +
  Explicitly prevent use of FEATURE_CONNECTION_SHARING without FEATURE_CONNECTION_KEEP_ALIVE. It makes no + sense and does not compile anyway. Sponsored by: Robert Klemme
  +
- +
  Fix build without FEATURE_CONNECTION_KEEP_ALIVE. Sponsored by: Robert Klemme
  +
- +
  Downgrade the 'Graceful termination requested' message to LOG_LEVEL_INFO as it isn't an error. Sponsored + by: Robert Klemme
  +
- +
  decompress_iob(): Downgrade the no-content message to LOG_LEVEL_RE_FILTER While at it, fix a typo in a + comment. Sponsored by: Robert Klemme
  +
- +
  Fixed a couple of cppcheck warnings.
  +
- +
  Rename LOG_LEVEL_GPC to LOG_LEVEL_REQUEST. Only the shadow knows what "GPC" is supposed to stand + for.
  +
- +
  Remove SourceForge references in copyright headers.
  +
- +
  Upgrade a bunch of links to the homepage to https://.
  +
- +
  Add 'no-brotli-accepted' filter which prevents the use of Brotli compression.
  +
- +
  Changed license for pcrs to GPLv2+ after getting the permission from Andreas. This allows to + redistribute Privoxy under the GPLv3 which is required when linking to future mbedTLS versions which are + expected to be licensed under the Apache 2.0 license only.
  +
- +
  Updated a bunch of tests that have to expect status code 403 now after r1.168/070e904afa5.
  +
- +
  Lowercase the host name in the request line.
  +
- +
  Only set SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH if it's not already set so distributions can overwrite it through the + environment.
  +
+
+
Documentation changes:
+
- +
  Explain that Privoxy has to be distributed under the GPLv3 (or later) when linked with an MbedTLS + version that is licensed under the Apache 2.0 license.
  +
- +
  Import the GNU GPLv3 and include it the user manual.
  +
- +
  Clarify FEATURE_FORCE_LOAD's description. It allows to bypass blocking not filtering and only does it if + blocks aren't enforced. Reported by: Robert Klemme
  +
- +
  FAQ: Remove Zwiebelfreunde e.V. from the list of fiduciary sponsors As of 2021 they no longer handle + donations for foreign organisations due to lack of resources.
  +
- +
  FAQ: Remove an obsolete comment with a link to the long-gone PDF manual.
  +
- +
  FAQ: Add a link to the TODO list.
  +
- +
  FAQ: Change the sponsor amounts to USD slightly rounding the converted amounts up to get simple numbers. + Receiving USD is apparently easier for SPI and SPI is preferred by sponsors as they can send invoices.
  +
- +
  Advertise the client-tags CGI page in the user manual.
  +
- +
  Stop advertising the show-version CGI page which no longer exists.
  +
- +
  Add yet another reason why +prevent-compression may cause problems.
  +
- +
  Don't claim that contributors need ssh. It's only needed for committers.
  +
- +
  Replace obsolete CVS instructions with Git instructions.
  +
- +
  Remove an obsolete comment
  +
+
+
Config file changes:
+
- +
  Change the suggested default-server-timeout to 5 to match the suggested keep-alive-timeout. Otherwise + using the defaults would result in Privoxy reducing the default-server-timeout and logging an error + message. Sponsored by: Robert Klemme
  +
- +
  Update the 'debug 1' description.
  +
- +
  Add a missing 'client-specific-tag' directive.
  +
- +
  Comment out trusted-cgi-referer pointing to example.org.
  +
+
+
Action file improvements:
+
- +
  Block requests to /(.*/)?piwik\.php
  +
- +
  Block requests to .connectaserver.de/
  +
- +
  Block requests to pixel.inforsea.com/
  +
- +
  Block requests to t.vi-serve.com/
  +
- +
  Block requests to .ioam.de/
  +
- +
  Block requests to t.9gag.com/img.gif
  +
- +
  Block requests to .pixel.parsely.com/ as image
  +
- +
  Block requests to pixel.wp.com/
  +
- +
  Disable fast-redirects for .librarything.com/
  +
- +
  Disable fast-redirects for issue.freebsdfoundation.org/
  +
- +
  Disable fast-redirects for .twitter.com/.*origin=http
  +
- +
  Unblock belco24.de/
  +
- +
  Add fast-redirects exception for .wikipedia.org/
  +
- +
  Add fast-redirects exception for oss-fuzz.com/
  +
- +
  Disable fast-redirects for .consensu.org/delivery/pixel\.php and block the requests as image instead
  +
- +
  Unblock .adbinstaller.com/ Reported by lvm in #942.
  +
- +
  Unblock .adbshell.com Reported by lvm in #942.
  +
- +
  Unblock .tagesschau.de/
  +
- +
  Disable fast-redirects for collector.githubapp.com/ and block requests to it as image instead
  +
- +
  Unblock 'ada*.'
  +
- +
  Add fast-redirects{} exception for sourcepoint.vice.com/
  +
- +
  Unblock adaway.org/ Reported by DRS David Soft in AF#945.
  +
- +
  Change two block reasons that previously were the same. Sponsored by: Robert Klemme
  +
- +
  Added a +delay-response{} test.
  +
- +
  Updated the location of the development version of default.action.master.
  +
+
+
Privoxy-Log-Parser:
+
- +
  Added a --keep-date option to keep the date in highlighted messages.
  +
- +
  Highlight new log messages.
  +
- +
  Make gather_loglevel_clf_stats() more tolerant. While at it, count all CLF messages as requests, even if + the request is invalid.
  +
- +
  Only show HTTP version distribution if at least one version has been detected.
  +
- +
  Only show crunch statistics if crunches were detected.
  +
- +
  Warn if the request counts differ.
  +
- +
  Generate statistics if the log only contains LOG_LEVEL_CLF messages so it can be used with vanilla + webserver logs. Previously Privoxy-specific "Request:" messages were required.
  +
- +
  Align the client-HTTP-version distribution like other distributions
  +
- +
  Bump version to 0.9.1
  +
- +
  Include status code distribution in the stats.
  +
- +
  Let the statistics include the size of the content Privoxy transferred excluding HTTP headers.
  +
- +
  Get with the program and expect all requests to be logged with LOG_LEVEL_REQUEST. It's no longer + necessary to count both LOG_LEVEL_REQUEST and LOG_LEVEL_CRUNCH messages to get the total number of + requests.
  +
- +
  Leverage the LOG_LEVEL_CLF message to gather statistics that where previously taken from + LOG_LEVEL_HEADER lines. This results in less confusing results if https inspection is enabled in which case + there are two LOG_LEVEL_HEADER lines with request lines. Sponsored by: Robert Klemme
  +
- +
  Properly highlight the filter results message. Previously a brace got lost.
  +
- +
  Prefer the number of CLF lines to get the total number of requests as it works with older Privoxy + versions as well.
  +
+
+
Privoxy-Regression-Test:
+
- +
  Turn curl's globbing mode off so we can allow more characters in URLs.
  +
- +
  Allow '[' and ']' in URLs.
  +
- +
  Include the action file when complaining about missing Sticky Actions.
  +
- +
  Fix a sentence in the documentation.
  +
- +
  Bump version to 0.7.1
  +
+
+
url-pattern-translator:
+
- +
  Detect a couple of pattern prefixes case-insensitively. Sponsored by: Robert Klemme
  +
- +
  Skip CLIENT-TAG patterns. Sponsored by: Robert Klemme
  +
- +
  Skip patterns that have already been converted. It should now be safe to "convert" a file multiple + times. Sponsored by: Robert Klemme
  +
- +
  Add the new 'PCRE-HOST-PATTERN:' prefix. Sponsored by: Robert Klemme
  +
+

3.1. Note to Upgraders

A quick list of things to be aware of before upgrading from earlier versions of Privoxy:

+
The recommended way to upgrade Privoxy is to backup your old + configuration files, install the new ones, verify that Privoxy is working + correctly and finally merge back your changes using diff and maybe + patch.
+
There are a number of new features in each Privoxy release and most of + them have to be explicitly enabled in the configuration files. Old configuration files obviously don't do + that and due to syntax changes using old configuration files with a new Privoxy isn't always possible anyway.
+
+
Note that some installers remove earlier versions completely, including configuration files, therefore you + should really save any important configuration files!
+
+
On the other hand, other installers don't overwrite existing configuration files, thinking you will want + to do that yourself.
+
+
In the default configuration only fatal errors are logged now. You can change that in the debug section of the configuration file. You may also want to enable more verbose + logging until you verified that the new Privoxy version is working as + expected.
+
+
Three other config file settings are now off by default: enable-remote-toggle, enable-remote-http-toggle, and enable-edit-actions. If you use or want these, you will need to + explicitly enable them, and be aware of the security issues involved.
+

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Installation		Quickstart to Using Privoxy

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Installation		Quickstart to Using Privoxy