1 Privoxy Frequently Asked Questions
3 Copyright © 2001, 2002 by Privoxy Developers
5 $Id: faq.sgml,v 2.2 2002/09/05 04:25:05 hal9 Exp $
7 This FAQ gives quick answers to frequently asked questions about Privoxy. It
8 can't and doesn't replace the User Manual.
10 Privoxy is a web proxy with advanced filtering capabilities for protecting
11 privacy, filtering web page content, managing cookies, controlling access, and
12 removing ads, banners, pop-ups and other obnoxious Internet junk. Privoxy has a
13 very flexible configuration and can be customized to suit individual needs and
14 tastes. Privoxy has application for both stand-alone systems and multi-user
17 Privoxy is based on Internet Junkbuster (tm).
19 Please note that this document is constantly evolving. This copy represents the
20 state at the release of version 3.1.1. You can find the latest version of the
21 document at http://www.privoxy.org/faq/. Please see the Contact section if you
22 want to contact the developers.
24 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
27 1. General Information
29 1.1. What is this new version of Privoxy?
30 1.2. Why "Privoxy"? Why a name change at all?
31 1.3. How does Privoxy differ from the old Junkbuster?
32 1.4. What is a "proxy"? How does Privoxy work?
33 1.5. How does Privoxy know what is an ad, and what is not?
34 1.6. Can Privoxy make mistakes? This does not sound very scientific.
35 1.7. My browser does the same things as Privoxy. Why should I use Privoxy
37 1.8. Is there is a license or fee? What about a warranty? Registration?
38 1.9. I would like to help you, what do I do?
40 1.9.1. Money Money Money
42 1.9.3. You want to work with us?
46 2.1. Which browsers are supported by Privoxy?
47 2.2. Which operating systems are supported?
48 2.3. Can I install Privoxy over Junkbuster?
49 2.4. I just installed Privoxy. Is there anything special I have to do now?
50 2.5. What is the proxy address of Privoxy?
51 2.6. I just installed Privoxy, and nothing is happening. All the ads are
56 3.1. Where can I get updated Actions Files?
57 3.2. Can I use my old config files?
58 3.3. What is an "actions" file?
59 3.4. The "actions" concept confuses me. Please list some of these
61 3.5. How are actions files configured? What is the easiest way to do this?
62 3.6. There are several different "actions" files. What are the differences?
63 3.7. How can I make my Yahoo/Hotmail/GMX account work?
64 3.8. What's the difference between the "Cautious", "Medium" and "Advanced"
66 3.9. Why can I change the configuration with a browser? Does that not raise
68 3.10. What is the default.filter file? What is a "filter"?
69 3.11. How can I set up Privoxy to act as a proxy for my LAN?
70 3.12. Instead of ads, now I get a checkerboard pattern. I don't want to see
72 3.13. Why would anybody want to see a checkerboard pattern?
73 3.14. I see some images being replaced by a text instead of the
74 checkerboard image. Why and how do I get rid of this?
75 3.15. Can Privoxy run as a service on Win2K/NT?
76 3.16. How can I make Privoxy work with other proxies like Squid?
77 3.17. Can I just set Privoxy to use port 80 and thus avoid individual
78 browser configuration?
79 3.18. Can Privoxy run as a "transparent" proxy?
83 4.1. How much does Privoxy slow my browsing down? This has to add extra
85 4.2. I noticed considerable delays in page requests compared to the old
86 Junkbuster. What's wrong?
87 4.3. What are "http://config.privoxy.org/" and "http://p.p/"?
88 4.4. Do you still maintain the blocklists?
89 4.5. How can I submit new ads?
90 4.6. How can I hide my IP address?
91 4.7. Can Privoxy guarantee I am anonymous?
92 4.8. Might some things break because header information or content is being
94 4.9. Can Privoxy act as a "caching" proxy to speed up web browsing?
95 4.10. What about as a firewall? Can Privoxy protect me?
96 4.11. I have large empty spaces / a checkerboard pattern now where ads used
98 4.12. How can Privoxy filter Secure (HTTPS) URLs?
99 4.13. Privoxy runs as a "server". How secure is it? Do I need to take any
101 4.14. How can I temporarily disable Privoxy?
102 4.15. When "disabled" is Privoxy totally out of the picture?
103 4.16. My logs show Privoxy "crunches" ads, but also its own CGI pages. What
105 4.17. Can Privoxy effect files that I download from a webserver? FTP
107 4.18. Where can I find more information about Privoxy and related issues?
111 5.1. I just upgraded and am getting "connection refused" with every web
113 5.2. I just added a new rule, but the steenkin ad is still getting through.
115 5.3. One of my favorite sites does not work with Privoxy. What can I do?
116 5.4. After installing Privoxy, I have to log in every time I start IE. What
118 5.5. I cannot connect to any FTP sites. Privoxy seems to be blocking me.
119 5.6. In Mac OSX, I can't configure Microsoft Internet Explorer to use
120 Privoxy as the HTTP proxy.
121 5.7. In Mac OSX, I dragged the Privoxy folder to the trash in order to
122 uninstall it. Now the finder tells me I don't have sufficient
123 privileges to empty the trash.
124 5.8. I get a completely blank page at one site. "View Source" shows only:
125 <html><body></body></html>.
127 6. Contacting the developers, Bug Reporting and Feature Requests
131 6.3. Request New Features
132 6.4. Report Ads or Other Actions-Related Problems
135 7. Privoxy Copyright, License and History
140 1. General Information
142 1.1. What is this new version of Privoxy?
144 In the beginning, there was the Internet Junkbuster, by Anonymous Coders and
145 Junkbusters Corporation. It saved many users a lot of pain in the early days of
146 web advertising and user tracking.
148 But the web, its protocols and standards, and with it, the techniques for
149 forcing users to consume ads, give up autonomy over their browsing, and for
150 spying on them, kept evolving. Unfortunately, the Internet Junkbuster did not.
151 Version 2.0.2, published in 1998, was (and is) the last official release
152 available from Junkbusters Corporation. Fortunately, it had been released under
153 the GNU GPL, which allowed further development by others.
155 So Stefan Waldherr started maintaining an improved version of the software, to
156 which eventually a number of people contributed patches. It could already
157 replace banners with a transparent image, and had a first version of pop-up
158 killing, but it was still very closely based on the original, with all its
159 limitations, such as the lack of HTTP/1.1 support, flexible per-site
160 configuration, or content modification. The last release from this effort was
161 version 2.0.2-10, published in 2000.
163 Then, some developers picked up the thread, and started turning the software
164 inside out, upside down, and then reassembled it, adding many new features
167 The result of this is Privoxy, whose first stable release, 3.0, was released
170 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
172 1.2. Why "Privoxy"? Why a name change at all?
174 Privoxy is the "Privacy Enhancing Proxy". Also, its content modification and
175 junk suppression allow you to browse your "private edition" of the web.
177 Junkbusters Corporation continues to offer their original version of the
178 Internet Junkbuster, so publishing our Junkbuster-derived software under the
179 same name led to confusion.
181 There are also potential legal complications from the continued use of the
182 Junkbuster name, which is a registered trademark of Junkbusters Corporation.
183 There are, however, no objections from Junkbusters Corporation to the Privoxy
184 project itself, and they, in fact, still share our ideals and goals.
186 The developers also believed that there are so many changes from the original
187 code, that it was time to make a clean break from the past and make a name in
188 their own right, especially now with the pending release of version 3.0.
190 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
192 1.3. How does Privoxy differ from the old Junkbuster?
194 Privoxy picks up where Junkbuster left off. All the old features remain. The
195 new Privoxy still blocks ads and banners, still manages cookies, and still
196 helps protect your privacy. But, these are all enhanced, and many new features
197 have been added, all in the same vein.
199 The configuration has changed significantly as well. This is something that
200 users will notice right off the bat if upgrading from Junkbuster 2.0.x. The
201 "blocklist" "cookielist", "imagelist" and much more has been combined into the
202 "actions" files, with a completely different syntax. See the note to upgraders
205 Privoxy's new features include:
207 * Integrated browser based configuration and control utility at http://
208 config.privoxy.org/ (shortcut: http://p.p/). Browser-based tracing of rule
209 and filter effects. Remote toggling.
211 * Web page content filtering (removes banners based on size, invisible
212 "web-bugs", JavaScript and HTML annoyances, pop-up windows, etc.)
214 * Modularized configuration that allows for standard settings and user
215 settings to reside in separate files, so that installing updated actions
216 files won't overwrite individual user settings.
218 * HTTP/1.1 compliant (but not all optional 1.1 features are supported).
220 * Support for Perl Compatible Regular Expressions in the configuration files,
221 and generally a more sophisticated and flexible configuration syntax over
224 * Improved cookie management features (e.g. session based cookies).
228 * Bypass many click-tracking scripts (avoids script redirection).
230 * Multi-threaded (POSIX and native threads).
232 * User-customizable HTML templates for all proxy-generated pages (e.g.
235 * Auto-detection and re-reading of config file changes.
237 * Improved signal handling, and a true daemon mode (Unix).
239 * Every feature now controllable on a per-site or per-location basis,
240 configuration more powerful and versatile over-all.
242 * Many smaller new features added, limitations and bugs removed, and security
245 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
247 1.4. What is a "proxy"? How does Privoxy work?
249 A web proxy is a service, based on a software such as Privoxy, that clients
250 (i.e. browsers) can use instead of connecting directly to the web servers on
251 the Internet. The clients then ask the proxy to fetch the objects they need
252 (web pages, images, movies etc) on their behalf, and when the proxy has done
253 so, it hands the results back to the client.
255 There are many reasons to use web proxies, such as security (firewalling),
256 efficiency (caching) and others, and there are just as many different proxies
257 to accommodate those needs.
259 Privoxy is a proxy that is solely focused on privacy protection and junk
260 elimination. Sitting between your browser(s) and the Internet, it is in a
261 perfect position to filter outbound personal information that your browser is
262 leaking, as well as inbound junk. It uses a variety of techniques to do this,
263 all of which are under your control via the various configuration files and
266 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
268 1.5. How does Privoxy know what is an ad, and what is not?
270 Privoxy's approach to blocking ads is twofold:
272 First, there are certain patterns in the locations (URLs) of banner images.
273 This applies to both the path (you wouldn't guess how many web sites serve
274 their banners from a directory called "banners"!) and the host (blocking the
275 big banner hosting services like doublecklick.net already helps a lot). Privoxy
276 takes advantage of this fact by using URL patterns to sort out and block the
277 requests for banners.
279 Second, banners tend to come in certain sizes. But you can't tell the size of
280 an image by its URL without downloading it, and if you do, it's too late to
281 save bandwidth. Therefore, Privoxy also inspects the HTML sources of web pages
282 while they are loaded, and replaces references to images with standard banner
283 sizes by dummy references, so that your browser doesn't request them anymore in
286 Both of this involves a certain amount of guesswork and is, of course, freely
289 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
291 1.6. Can Privoxy make mistakes? This does not sound very scientific.
293 Actually, it's a black art ;-) And yes, it is always possible to have a broad
294 rule accidentally block or change something by mistake. There is a good chance
295 you may run into such a situation at some point. It is tricky writing rules to
296 cover every conceivable possibility, and not occasionally get false positives.
298 But this should not be a big concern since the Privoxy configuration is very
299 flexible, and includes tools to help identify these types of situations so they
300 can be addressed as needed, allowing you to customize your installation. (See
301 the Troubleshooting section below.)
303 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
305 1.7. My browser does the same things as Privoxy. Why should I use Privoxy at
308 Modern browsers do indeed have some of the same functionality as Privoxy. Maybe
309 this is adequate for you. But Privoxy is much more versatile and powerful, and
310 can do a number of things that browsers just can't.
312 In addition, a proxy is good choice if you use multiple browsers, or have a LAN
313 with multiple computers. This way all the configuration is in one place, and
314 you don't have to maintain a similar configuration for possibly many browsers.
316 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
318 1.8. Is there is a license or fee? What about a warranty? Registration?
320 Privoxy is licensed under the GNU General Public License (GPL). It is free to
321 use, copy, modify or distribute as you wish under the terms of this license.
322 Please see the Copyright section for more information on the license and
323 copyright. Or the LICENSE file that should be included.
325 There is no warranty of any kind, expressed, implied or otherwise. That is
326 something that would cost real money ;-) There is no registration either.
327 Privoxy really is free in every respect!
329 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
331 1.9. I would like to help you, what do I do?
333 1.9.1. Money Money Money
335 We, of course, welcome donations and could use money for domain registering,
336 buying software to test Privoxy with, and, of course, for regular world-wide
337 get-togethers (hahaha). If you enjoy the software and feel like helping us with
338 a donation, just drop us a note.
340 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
344 If you are a vendor of a web-related software like a browser, web server or
345 proxy, and would like us to ensure that Privoxy runs smoothly with your
346 product, you might consider supplying us with a copy or license. We can't,
347 however, guarantee that we will fix all potential compatibility issues as a
350 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
352 1.9.3. You want to work with us?
354 Well, helping the team is always a good idea. We welcome new developers,
355 packaging gurus or documentation writers. Simply get an account on
356 SourceForge.net and mail your id to the developers mailing list. Then read the
359 Once we have added you to the team, you'll have write access to the CVS
360 repository, and together we'll find a suitable task for you.
362 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
366 2.1. Which browsers are supported by Privoxy?
368 Any browser that can be configured to use a proxy, which should be virtually
369 all browsers. Direct browser support is not necessary since Privoxy runs as a
370 separate application and talks to the browser in the standardized HTTP
371 protocol, just like a web server does.
373 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
375 2.2. Which operating systems are supported?
377 At present, Privoxy is known to run on Windows(95, 98, ME, 2000, XP), Linux
378 (RedHat, SuSE, Debian, Conectiva, Gentoo, Slackware), Mac OSX, OS/2, AmigaOS,
379 BeOS, FreeBSD, NetBSD, Solaris, and more flavors of Unix.
381 But any operating system that runs TCP/IP, can conceivably take advantage of
382 Privoxy in a networked situation where Privoxy would run as a server on a LAN
383 gateway. Then only the "gateway" needs to be running one of the above operating
386 Source code is freely available, so porting to other operating systems is
387 always a possibility.
389 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
391 2.3. Can I install Privoxy over Junkbuster?
393 We recommend you un-install Junkbuster first to minimize conflicts and
394 confusion. You may want to save your old configuration files for future
395 reference. The configuration files and syntax have substantially changed, so
396 you will need to manually port your old patterns. See the note to upgraders and
397 installation chapter in the user manual for details.
399 Note: Some installers may automatically un-install Junkbuster, if present!
401 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
403 2.4. I just installed Privoxy. Is there anything special I have to do now?
405 All browsers must be told to use Privoxy as a proxy by specifying the correct
406 proxy address and port number in the appropriate configuration area for the
407 browser. See below. You should also flush your browser's memory and disk cache
408 to get rid of any cached junk items.
410 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
412 2.5. What is the proxy address of Privoxy?
414 If you set up the Privoxy to run on the computer you browse from (rather than
415 your ISP's server or some networked computer on a LAN), the proxy will be on
416 127.0.0.1 (sometimes referred to as "localhost", which is the special name used
417 by every computer on the Internet to refer to itself) and the port will be 8118
418 (unless you have Privoxy to run on a different port with the listen-address
421 When configuring your browser's proxy settings you typically enter the word
422 "localhost" or the IP address "127.0.0.1" in the boxes next to "HTTP" and
423 "Secure" (HTTPS) and then the number "8118" for "port". This tells your browser
424 to send all web requests to Privoxy instead of directly to the Internet.
426 Privoxy can also be used to proxy for a Local Area Network. In this case, your
427 would enter either the IP address of the LAN host where Privoxy is running, or
428 the equivalent hostname. Port assignment would be same as above. Note that
429 Privoxy doesn't listen on any LAN interfaces by default.
431 Privoxy does not currently handle protocols such as FTP, SMTP, IM, IRC, ICQ, or
432 other Internet protocols.
434 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
436 2.6. I just installed Privoxy, and nothing is happening. All the ads are there.
439 Did you configure your browser to use Privoxy as a proxy? It does not sound
440 like it. See above. You might also try flushing the browser's caches to force a
441 full re-reading of pages. You can verify that Privoxy is running, and your
442 browser is correctly configured by entering the special URL: http://
443 config.privoxy.org/. This should take you to a page titled "This is Privoxy.."
444 with access to Privoxy's internal configuration. If you see this, then you are
445 good to go. If you receive a page saying "Privoxy is not running", then the
446 browser is not set up to use your Privoxy installation. If you receive anything
447 else (probably nothing at all), it could either be that the browser is not set
448 up correctly, or that Privoxy is not running at all. Check the log file.
450 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
454 3.1. Where can I get updated Actions Files?
456 Based on your feedback and the continuing development, updated actions files
457 will be made available on the files section of our project page.
459 If you wish to receive an email notification whenever we release updates of
460 Privoxy or the actions file, subscribe to our announce mailing list,
461 ijbswa-announce@lists.sourceforge.net.
463 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
465 3.2. Can I use my old config files?
467 The syntax, number, and purpose of configuration files has substantially
468 changed from Junkbuster and earlier versions of Privoxy. The old files, like
469 blocklist will not work at all. If you are upgrading from a 2.0.x version, you
470 will need to port your configuration data to the new format. Note that even the
471 pattern syntax has changed! Even configuration files from the 2.9.x versions
472 will need to be adapted, as configuration syntax has been very much in flow in
475 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
477 3.3. What is an "actions" file?
479 Actions files are where various actions that Privoxy might take while
480 processing a certain request, are configured. Typically, you would define a set
481 of default actions that apply to all URLs, then add exceptions to these
482 defaults where needed.
484 Actions can be defined on a URL pattern basis, i.e. for single URLs, whole web
485 sites, groups or parts thereof etc. Actions can also be grouped together and
486 then applied to requests matching one or more patterns. There are many possible
487 actions that might apply to any given site. As an example, if you are blocking
488 cookies as one of your default actions, but need to accept cookies from a given
489 site, you would need to define an exception for this site in one of your
490 actions files, preferably in user.action
492 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
494 3.4. The "actions" concept confuses me. Please list some of these "actions".
496 For a comprehensive discussion of the actions concept, please refer to the
497 actions file chapter in the user manual. It includes a list of all actions and
498 an actions file tutorial to get you started.
500 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
502 3.5. How are actions files configured? What is the easiest way to do this?
504 Actions files are just text files in a special syntax and can be edited with a
505 text editor. But probably the easiest way is to access Privoxy's user interface
506 with your web browser at http://config.privoxy.org/ (Shortcut: http://p.p/) and
507 then select "View & change the current configuration" from the menu.
509 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
511 3.6. There are several different "actions" files. What are the differences?
513 As of Privoxy v2.9.15, three actions files are being included, to be used for
514 different purposes: These are default.action, the "main" actions file which is
515 actively maintained by the Privoxy developers, user.action, where users are
516 encouraged to make their private customizations, and standard.action, which is
517 for internal Privoxy use only. Please see the actions chapter in the user
518 manual for a more detailed explanation.
520 Earlier versions included three different versions of the default.action file.
521 The new scheme allows for greater flexibility of local configuration, and for
522 browser based selection of pre-defined "aggressiveness" levels.
524 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
526 3.7. How can I make my Yahoo/Hotmail/GMX account work?
528 The default configuration shouldn't impact the usability of any of these
529 services. It will, however, make all cookies temporary, so that your browser
530 will forget your login credentials in between browser sessions. If you would
531 like not to have to log in manually each time you access those websites, simply
532 turn off all cookie handling for them in the user.action file. An example for
533 yahoo might look like:
535 # Allow all cookies for Yahoo login:
537 { -crunch-incoming-cookies -crunch-outgoing-cookies -session-cookies-only }
540 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
542 3.8. What's the difference between the "Cautious", "Medium" and "Advanced"
545 Configuring Privoxy is not entirely trivial. To help you get started, we
546 provide you with three different default action "packages" in the web based
547 actions file editor at http://config.privoxy.org/show-status. The following
548 table shows you, which of the most important features are enabled in each
551 Table 1. Default Configurations
553 +-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
554 |Feature |Cautious |Intermadiate |Advanced |
555 |-------------------+------------------+-------------------+------------------|
556 |Ad-blocking by URL |yes |yes |yes |
557 |-------------------+------------------+-------------------+------------------|
558 |Ad-filtering by |yes |yes |yes |
560 |-------------------+------------------+-------------------+------------------|
561 |GIF de-animation |no |yes |yes |
562 |-------------------+------------------+-------------------+------------------|
563 |Referer forging |no |yes |yes |
564 |-------------------+------------------+-------------------+------------------|
565 |Cookie handling |none |session-only |kill |
566 |-------------------+------------------+-------------------+------------------|
567 |Pop-up killing |no |yes |yes |
568 |-------------------+------------------+-------------------+------------------|
569 |Fast redirects |no |no |yes |
570 |-------------------+------------------+-------------------+------------------|
571 |HTML taming |yes |yes |yes |
572 |-------------------+------------------+-------------------+------------------|
573 |JavaScript taming |yes |yes |yes |
574 |-------------------+------------------+-------------------+------------------|
575 |Web-bug killing |yes |yes |yes |
576 |-------------------+------------------+-------------------+------------------|
577 |Fun text |no |no |yes |
578 |replacements | | | |
579 |-------------------+------------------+-------------------+------------------|
580 |Image tag |no |no |yes |
582 |-------------------+------------------+-------------------+------------------|
583 |Ad-filtering by |no |no |yes |
585 +-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
587 Where the defaults are likely to break some sites, exceptions for known popular
588 "problem" sites are included, but in general, the more aggressive your default
589 settings are, the more exceptions you will have to make later. See the user
590 manual for a more deatiled discussion.
592 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
594 3.9. Why can I change the configuration with a browser? Does that not raise
597 It may seem strange that regular users can edit the config files with their
598 browsers, although the whole /etc/privoxy hierarchy belongs to the user
599 "privoxy", with only 644 permissions.
601 When you use the browser-based editor, Privoxy itself is writing to the config
602 files. Because Privoxy is running as the user "privoxy", it can update the
605 If you run Privoxy for multiple untrusted users (e.g. in a LAN), you will
606 probably want to turn the web-based editor and remote toggle features off by
607 setting "enable-edit-actions 0" and "enable-remote-toggle 0" in the main
610 Note that in the default configuration, only local users (i.e. those on
611 "localhost") can connect to Privoxy, so this is not (normally) a security
614 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
616 3.10. What is the default.filter file? What is a "filter"?
618 The default.filter file is where filters are defined, which can be used to
619 modify or remove, web page content on the fly. Filters apply to anything in the
620 page source, including HTML tags, and JavaScript. Regular expressions are used
621 to accomplish this. There are a number of pre-defined filters to deal with
622 common annoyances. The filters are only defined here, to invoke them, you need
623 to use the filter action in one of the actions files. Filtering is
624 automatically disabled for inappropriate MIME types.
626 If you are familiar with regular expressions, and HTML, you can look at the
627 provided default.filter with a text editor and define your own filters. This is
628 potentially a very powerful feature, but requires some expertise in both
629 regular expressions and HTML/HTTP.
631 Presently, there is no GUI editor option for this part of the configuration,
632 but you can disable/enable the various pre-defined filters of the included
633 default.filter file with the web-based actions file editor.
635 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
637 3.11. How can I set up Privoxy to act as a proxy for my LAN?
639 By default, Privoxy only responds to requests from 127.0.0.1 (localhost). To
640 have it act as a server for a network, this needs to be changed in the main
641 configuration file. Look for the listen-address option, which may be commented
642 out with a "#" symbol. Make sure it is uncommented, and assign it the address
643 of the LAN gateway interface, and port number to use. Assuming your LAN address
644 is 192.168.1.1 and you wish to run Privoxy on port 8118, this line should look
647 listen-address 192.168.1.1:8118
649 Save the file, and restart Privoxy. Configure all browsers on the network then
650 to use this address and port number.
652 If you run Privoxy on a LAN with untrusted users, we recommend that you
653 double-check the access control and security options!
655 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
657 3.12. Instead of ads, now I get a checkerboard pattern. I don't want to see
660 The replacement for blocked images can be controlled with the set-image-blocker
661 action. You have the choice of a checkerboard pattern, a transparent 1x1 GIF
662 image (aka "blank"), or a redirect to a custom image of your choice. Note that
663 this choice only has effect for images which are blocked as images, i.e. whose
664 URLs match both a handle-as-image and block action.
666 If you want to see nothing, then change the set-image-blocker action to
667 "blank". This can be done by editing the default.action file, or trough the
668 web-based actions file editor.
670 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
672 3.13. Why would anybody want to see a checkerboard pattern?
674 Remember that telling which image is an ad and which isn't, is mostly
675 guesswork. While we hope that the standard configuration is rather smart, it
676 can and will make errors. The checkerboard image is visually decent, but it
677 shows you that and where images were blocked, which can be very helpful in case
678 some navigation aid or otherwise innocent image was erraneously blocked. Some
679 people might also enjoy seeing how many banners they don't have to see..
681 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
683 3.14. I see some images being replaced by a text instead of the checkerboard
684 image. Why and how do I get rid of this?
686 This happens when the banners are not embedded in the HTML code of the page
687 itself, but in separate HTML (sub)documents that are loaded into (i)frames or
688 (i)layers, and these external HTML documents are blocked. Being non-images they
689 get replaced by a substitute HTML page rather than a substitute image, which
690 wouldn't work out technically, since the browser expects and accepts only HTML
691 when it has requested an HTML document.
693 The substitute page adapts to the available space and shows itself as a
694 miniature two-liner if loaded into small frames, or full-blown with a large red
695 "BLOCKED" banner if space allows.
697 If you prefer the banners to be blocked by images, you must see to it that the
698 HTML documents in which they are embedded are not blocked. Clicking the "See
699 why" link offered in the substitute page will show you which rule blocked the
700 page. After changing the rule and un-blocking the HTML documents, the browser
701 will try to load the actual banner images and the usual image blocking will
702 (hopefully!) kick in.
704 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
706 3.15. Can Privoxy run as a service on Win2K/NT?
708 Yes, it can run as a system service using srvany.exe. The only catch is that
709 this will effectively disable the Privoxy icon (and its menu!) in the taskbar.
710 You can have one or the other, but not both at this time :(
712 There is a pending feature request for this functionality. See the discussion
713 at http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?func=detail&atid=361118&aid=485617&group_id=
714 11118, for details, and a sample configuration.
716 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
718 3.16. How can I make Privoxy work with other proxies like Squid?
720 This can be done and is often useful to combine the benefits of Privoxy with
721 those of a caching proxy. See the forwarding chapter in the user manual which
722 describes how to do this.
724 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
726 3.17. Can I just set Privoxy to use port 80 and thus avoid individual browser
729 No, its more complicated than that. This only works with special kinds of
730 proxies known as "transparent" proxies (see below).
732 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
734 3.18. Can Privoxy run as a "transparent" proxy?
736 No, Privoxy currently does not have this ability, though it is planned for a
737 future release. Transparent proxies require special handling of the request
738 headers beyond what Privoxy is now capable of.
740 Chaining Privoxy behind another proxy that has this ability should work though.
741 See the forwarding chapter in the user manual. As a transparent proxy to be
742 used for chaining we recommend Transproxy (http://www.transproxy.nlc.net.au/).
744 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
748 4.1. How much does Privoxy slow my browsing down? This has to add extra time to
751 It should not slow you down any in real terms, and may actually help speed
752 things up since ads, banners and other junk are not being displayed. The actual
753 processing time required by Privoxy itself for each page, is relatively small
754 in the overall scheme of things, and happens very quickly. This is typically
755 more than offset by time saved not downloading and rendering ad images.
757 "Filtering" content via the filter or deanimate-gifs actions may cause a
758 perceived slowdown, since the entire document needs to be buffered before
759 displaying. See below.
761 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
763 4.2. I noticed considerable delays in page requests compared to the old
764 Junkbuster. What's wrong?
766 If you use any filter action, such as filtering banners by size, web-bugs etc,
767 or the deanimate-gifs action, the entire document must be loaded into memory in
768 order for the filtering mechanism to work, and nothing is sent to the browser
771 The loading time does not really change in real numbers, but the feeling is
772 different, because most browsers are able to start rendering incomplete
773 content, giving the user a feeling of "it works". This effect is especially
774 noticeable on slow dialup connections.
776 Filtering is automatically disabled for inappropriate MIME types.
778 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
780 4.3. What are "http://config.privoxy.org/" and "http://p.p/"?
782 http://config.privoxy.org/ is the address of Privoxy's built-in user interface,
783 and http://p.p/ is a shortcut for it.
785 Since Privoxy sits between your web browser and the Internet, it can simply
786 intercept requests for these addresses and answer them with its built-in "web
789 This also makes for a good test for your browser configuration: If entering the
790 URL http://config.privoxy.org/ takes you to a page saying "This is Privoxy..",
791 everything is OK. If you get a page saying "Privoxy is not working" instead,
792 then your browser didn't use Privoxy for the request, hence it could not be
793 intercepted, and you have accessed the real web site at config.privoxy.org.
795 With recent versions of Privoxy (version 2.9.x and later), the user interface
796 features information on the run time status, the configuration, and even a
797 built-in editor for the actions files.
799 Note that the built-in URLs from earlier versions of Junkbuster / Privoxy,
800 http://example.com/show-proxy-args and http://i.j.b/, are no longer supported.
801 If you still use such an old version, you should really consider upgrading to
804 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
806 4.4. Do you still maintain the blocklists?
808 No. The patterns for blocking now reside (among other things) in the actions
809 files, which are actively maintained instead. See next question ...
811 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
813 4.5. How can I submit new ads?
815 Yes, absolutely! Please see the Contact section for how to do that. Please note
816 that you (technically) need the latest Privoxy version for this to work.
818 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
820 4.6. How can I hide my IP address?
822 If you run both the browser and the proxy locally, you cannot hide your IP
823 address with Privoxy or any other software. The server needs to know your IP
824 address to send the answers back to you.
826 Fortunately there are many publicly usable anonymous proxies out there, which
827 solve the problem by providing a further level of indirection between you and
828 the web server, shared by many people, and thus letting your requests "drown"
829 in white noise of unrelated requests as far as user tracking is concerned.
831 Most of them will, however, log your IP address and make it available to the
832 authorities in case you abuse that anonymity for criminal purposes. In fact you
833 can't even rule out that some of them only exist to *collect* information on
834 (those suspicious) people with a more than average preference for privacy.
836 You can find a list of anonymous public proxies at multiproxy.org and many more
837 through Google. A particularly interesting project is the JAP service offered
838 by the Technical University of Dresden (http://anon.inf.tu-dresden.de/
841 There is, however, even in the single-machine case the possibility to make the
842 server believe that your machine is in fact a shared proxy serving a whole big
843 LAN, and we are looking into that.
845 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
847 4.7. Can Privoxy guarantee I am anonymous?
849 No. Your chances of remaining anonymous are greatly improved, but unless you
850 are an expert on Internet security it would be safest to assume that everything
851 you do on the Web can be traced back to you.
853 Privoxy can remove various information about you, and allows you more freedom
854 to decide which sites you can trust, and what details you want to reveal. But
855 it's still possible that web sites can find out who you are. Here's one way
858 A few browsers disclose the user's email address in certain situations, such as
859 when transferring a file by FTP. Privoxy does not filter FTP. If you need this
860 feature, or are concerned about the mail handler of your browser disclosing
861 your email address, you might consider products such as NSClean.
863 Browsers available only as binaries could use non-standard headers to give out
864 any information they can have access to: see the manufacturer's license
865 agreement. It's impossible to anticipate and prevent every breach of privacy
866 that might occur. The professionally paranoid prefer browsers available as
867 source code, because anticipating their behavior is easier. Trust the source,
870 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
872 4.8. Might some things break because header information or content is being
875 Definitely. More and more sites use HTTP header content to decide what to
876 display and how to display it. There is many ways that this can be handled, so
877 having hard and fast rules, is tricky.
879 "User-Agent" in particular is often used in this way to identify the browser,
880 and adjust content accordingly. Changing this now (at least not further than
881 removing the OS information) is not recommended, since so many sites do look
882 for it. You may get undesirable results by changing this.
884 For instance, different browsers use different encodings of Russian and Czech
885 characters, certain web servers convert pages on-the-fly according to the User
886 Agent header. Giving a "User Agent" with the wrong operating system or browser
887 manufacturer causes some sites in these languages to be garbled; Surfers to
888 Eastern European sites should change it to something closer. And then some page
889 access counters work by looking at the "Referer" header; they may fail or break
890 if unavailable. The weather maps of Intellicast have been blocked by their
891 server when no "Referer" or cookie is provided, is another example. (But you
892 can forge both headers without giving information away). There are many other
893 ways things can go wrong when trying to fool a web server.
895 Similar thoughts apply to modifying JavaScript, and, to a lesser degree, HTML
898 If you have problems with a site, you will have to adjust your configuration
899 accordingly. Cookies are probably the most likely adjustment that may be
900 required, but by no means the only one.
902 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
904 4.9. Can Privoxy act as a "caching" proxy to speed up web browsing?
906 No, it does not have this ability at all. You want something like Squid for
907 this. And, yes, before you ask, Privoxy can co-exist with other kinds of
908 proxies like Squid. See the forwarding chapter in the user manual for details.
910 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
912 4.10. What about as a firewall? Can Privoxy protect me?
914 Not in the way you mean, or in the way a true firewall can. Privoxy can help
915 protect your privacy, but not protect you from intrusion attempts. It is, of
916 course, perfectly possible and recommended to use both.
918 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
920 4.11. I have large empty spaces / a checkerboard pattern now where ads used to
923 It would be technically possible eliminate the banners in a way that frees
924 their screen estate in many cases, by doing all banner blocking with filters,
925 i.e. eliminating the whole image references from the HTML pages instead of
926 letting them stay in, and blocking the resulting requests for the banners
929 But this would consume considerable CPU resources, would likely destroy the
930 layout of many web pages which rely on the banners consuming a certain amount
931 of screen space, and would fail in other cases, where the screen space is
932 reserved e.g. by tables anyway. Also, making the banners disappear without a
933 visual trace complicates troubleshooting.
935 So we won't support this in the default configuration, but you can of course
936 define appropriate filters yourself.
938 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
940 4.12. How can Privoxy filter Secure (HTTPS) URLs?
942 Since secure HTTP connections are encrypted SSL sessions between your browser
943 and the secure site, and are meant to be reliably secure, there is little that
944 Privoxy can do but hand the raw gibberish data though from one end to the other
947 The only exception to this is blocking by host patterns, as the client needs to
948 tell Privoxy the name of the remote server, so that Privoxy can establish the
949 connection. If that name matches a host-only pattern, the connection will be
952 As far as ad blocking is concerned, this is less of a restriction than it may
953 seem, since ad sources are often identifiable by the host name, and often the
954 banners to be placed in an encrypted page come unencrypted nonetheless for
955 efficiency reasons, which exposes them to the full power of Privoxy's ad
958 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
960 4.13. Privoxy runs as a "server". How secure is it? Do I need to take any
963 There are no known exploits that might affect Privoxy. On Unix-like systems,
964 Privoxy can run as a non-privileged user, which is how we recommend it be run.
965 Also, by default Privoxy only listens to requests from "localhost" only. The
966 server aspect of Privoxy is not itself directly exposed to the Internet in this
967 configuration. If you want to have Privoxy serve as a LAN proxy, this will have
968 to be opened up to allow for LAN requests. In this case, we'd recommend you
969 specify only the LAN gateway address, e.g. 192.168.1.1, in the main Privoxy
970 configuration file and check all access control and security options. All LAN
971 hosts can then use this as their proxy address in the browser proxy
972 configuration, but Privoxy will not listen on any external interfaces. ACLs can
973 be defined in addition, and using a firewall is always good too. Better safe
976 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
978 4.14. How can I temporarily disable Privoxy?
980 The easiest way is to access Privoxy with your browser by using the remote
981 toggle URL: http://config.privoxy.org/toggle. See the Bookmarklets section of
982 the User Manual for an easy way to access this feature.
984 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
986 4.15. When "disabled" is Privoxy totally out of the picture?
988 No, this just means all filtering and actions are disabled. Privoxy is still
989 acting as a proxy, but just not doing any of the things that Privoxy would
990 normally be expected to do. It is still a "middle-man" in the interaction
991 between your browser and web sites.
993 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
995 4.16. My logs show Privoxy "crunches" ads, but also its own CGI pages. What is
998 A "crunch" simply means Privoxy intercepted something, nothing more. Often this
999 is indeed ads or banners, but Privoxy uses the same mechanism for trapping
1000 requests for its own internal pages. For instance, a request for Privoxy's
1001 configuration page at: http://config.privoxy.org, is intercepted (i.e. it does
1002 not go out to the 'net), and the familiar CGI configuration is returned to the
1003 browser, and the log consequently will show a "crunch".
1005 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1007 4.17. Can Privoxy effect files that I download from a webserver? FTP server?
1009 From the webserver's perspective, there is no difference between viewing a
1010 document (i.e. a page), and downloading a file. The same is true of Privoxy. If
1011 there is a match for a block pattern, it will still be blocked, and of course
1012 this is obvious. Filtering is potentially more of a concern since the results
1013 are not always so obvious.
1015 Privoxy knows the differences in files according to the "Document Type" as
1016 reported by the webserver. If this is reported accurately (e.g. "application/
1017 zip" for a zip archive), then Privoxy knows to ignore these where appropriate.
1018 It is possible, however, that documents that are of an unknown type (generally
1019 assumed to be "text/plain") will be filtered, as will those that might be
1020 incorrectly reported by the webserver. If such a file is a downloaded file that
1021 is intended to be saved to disk, then any content that might have been altered
1022 by filtering, will be saved too, for these (probably very rare) cases.
1024 Privoxy does not do FTP at all, only HTTP protocols.
1026 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1028 4.18. Where can I find more information about Privoxy and related issues?
1030 Other references and sites of interest to Privoxy users:
1032 http://www.privoxy.org/, the Privoxy Home page.
1034 http://www.privoxy.org/faq/, the Privoxy FAQ.
1036 http://sourceforge.net/projects/ijbswa/, the Project Page for Privoxy on
1039 http://config.privoxy.org/, the web-based user interface. Privoxy must be
1040 running for this to work. Shortcut: http://p.p/
1042 http://www.privoxy.org/actions/, to submit "misses" to the developers.
1044 http://cvs.sourceforge.net/cgi-bin/viewcvs.cgi/ijbswa/contrib/, cool and fun
1045 ideas from Privoxy users.
1047 http://www.junkbusters.com/ht/en/cookies.html, an explanation how cookies are
1048 used to track web users.
1050 http://www.junkbusters.com/ijb.html, the original Internet Junkbuster.
1052 http://www.waldherr.org/junkbuster/, Stefan Waldherr's version of Junkbuster,
1053 from which Privoxy was derived.
1055 http://privacy.net/analyze/, a useful site to check what information about you
1056 is leaked while you browse the web.
1058 http://www.squid-cache.org/, a very popular caching proxy, which is often used
1059 together with Privoxy.
1061 http://www.privoxy.org/developer-manual/, the Privoxy developer manual.
1063 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1067 5.1. I just upgraded and am getting "connection refused" with every web page?
1069 Either Privoxy is not running, or your browser is configured for a different
1070 port than what Privoxy is using.
1072 The old Privoxy (and also Junkbuster) used port 8000 by default. This has been
1073 changed to port 8118 now, due to a conflict with NAS (Network Audio Service),
1074 which uses port 8000. If you haven't, you need to change your browser to the
1075 new port number, or alternately change the listen-address option in Privoxy's
1076 main configuration file.
1078 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1080 5.2. I just added a new rule, but the steenkin ad is still getting through.
1083 If the ad had been displayed before you added its URL, it will probably be held
1084 in the browser's cache for some time, so it will be displayed without the need
1085 for any request to the server, and Privoxy will not be in the picture. The best
1086 thing to do is try flushing the browser's caches. And then try again.
1088 If this doesn't help, you probably have an error in the rule you applied. Try
1089 pasting the full URL of the offending ad into http://config.privoxy.org/
1090 show-url-info and see if it really matches your new rule.
1092 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1094 5.3. One of my favorite sites does not work with Privoxy. What can I do?
1096 First verify that it is indeed a Privoxy problem, by toggling off Privoxy
1097 through http://config.privoxy.org/toggle, and then shift-reloading the problem
1098 page (i.e. holding down the shift key while clicking reload. Alternatively,
1099 flush your browser's disk and memory caches).
1101 If still a problem, go to http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info and paste the
1102 full URL of the page in question into the prompt. See which actions are being
1103 applied to the URL, and which matches in which actions files are responsible
1104 for that. Now, armed with this information, go to http://config.privoxy.org/
1105 show-status and select the appropriate actions files for editing.
1107 You can now either look for a section which disables the actions that you
1108 suspect to cause the problem and add a pattern for your site there, or make up
1109 a completely new section for your site. In any case, the recommended way is to
1110 disable only the prime suspect, reload the problem page, and only if the
1111 problem persists, disable more and more actions until you have identified the
1112 culprit. You may or may not want to turn the other actions on again. Remember
1113 to flush your browser's caches in between any such changes!
1115 Alternately, if you are comfortable with a text editor, you can accomplish the
1116 same thing by editing the appropriate actions file. Probably the easiest way to
1117 deal with such problems when editing by hand is to add your site to a { fragile
1118 } section in user.action, which is an alias that turns off most "dangerous"
1119 actions, but is also likely to turn off more actions then needed, and thus
1120 lower your privacy and protection more than necessary,
1122 Troubleshooting actions is discussed in more detail in the user-manual appendix
1123 . There is also an actions tutorial.
1125 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1127 5.4. After installing Privoxy, I have to log in every time I start IE. What
1130 This is a quirk that effects the installation of Privoxy, in conjunction with
1131 Internet Explorer and Internet Connection Sharing on Windows 2000 and Windows
1132 XP. The symptoms may appear to be corrupted or invalid DUN settings, or
1135 When setting up an NT based Windows system with Privoxy you may find that
1136 things do not seem to be doing what you expect. When you set your system up you
1137 will probably have set up Internet Connection Sharing (ICS) with Dial up
1138 Networking (DUN) when logged in with administrator privileges. You will
1139 probably have made this DUN connection available to other accounts that you may
1140 have set-up on your system. E.g. Mum or Dad sets up the system and makes
1141 accounts suitably configured for the kids.
1143 When setting up Privoxy in this environment you will have to alter the proxy
1144 set-up of Internet Explorer (IE) for the specific DUN connection on which you
1145 wish to use Privoxy. When you do this the ICS DUN set-up becomes user specific.
1146 In this instance you will see no difference if you change the DUN connection
1147 under the account used to set-up the connection. However when you do this from
1148 another user you will notice that the DUN connection changes to make available
1149 to "Me only". You will also find that you have to store the password under each
1152 The reason for this is that each user's set-up for IE is user specific. Each
1153 set-up DUN connection and each LAN connection in IE store the settings for each
1154 user individually. As such this enforces individual configurations rather than
1155 common ones. Hence the first time you use a DUN connection after re-booting
1156 your system it may not perform as you expect, and prompt you for the password.
1157 Just set and save the password again and all should be OK.
1159 [Thanks to Ray Griffith for this submission.]
1161 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1163 5.5. I cannot connect to any FTP sites. Privoxy seems to be blocking me.
1165 Privoxy cannot act as a proxy for FTP traffic, so do not configure your browser
1166 to use Privoxy as an FTP proxy. The same is true for any protocol other than
1169 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1171 5.6. In Mac OSX, I can't configure Microsoft Internet Explorer to use Privoxy
1174 Microsoft Internet Explorer (in versions like 5.1) respects system-wide network
1175 settings. In order to change the HTTP proxy, open System Preferences, and click
1176 on the Network icon. In the settings pane that comes up, click on the Proxies
1177 tab. Ensure the "Web Proxy (HTTP)" checkbox is checked and enter 127.0.0.1 in
1178 the entry field. Enter 8118 in the Port field. The next time you start IE, it
1179 should reflect these values.
1181 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1183 5.7. In Mac OSX, I dragged the Privoxy folder to the trash in order to
1184 uninstall it. Now the finder tells me I don't have sufficient privileges to
1187 Just dragging the Privoxy folder to the trash is not enough to delete it.
1188 Privoxy supplies an uninstall.command file that takes care of these details.
1189 Open the trash, drag the uninstall.command file out of the trash and
1190 double-click on it. You will be prompted for confirmation and the
1191 administration password.
1193 The trash may still appear full after this command; emptying the trash from the
1194 desktop should make it appear empty again.
1196 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1198 5.8. I get a completely blank page at one site. "View Source" shows only:
1199 <html><body></body></html>.
1201 This is often the result of a webserver using PHP that mishandles the request
1202 Privoxy sends to not compress the content (a PHP bug).
1204 In a default configuration, Privoxy requests all data be sent "uncompressed".
1205 This is required for the page filtering and other magic to work. In some rare
1206 cases, the browser and webserver miscommunicate and the result is a totally
1207 blank page. The suggested work around is to selectively turn off this feature
1208 for sites that exhibit such behavior. Example section for user.action:
1210 # Make exceptions for ill-behaved sites:
1212 {-prevent-compression}
1215 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1217 6. Contacting the developers, Bug Reporting and Feature Requests
1219 We value your feedback. In fact, we rely on it to improve Privoxy and its
1220 configuration. However, please note the following hints, so we can provide you
1221 with the best support:
1223 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1227 For casual users, our support forum at SourceForge is probably best suited:
1228 http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?group_id=11118&atid=211118
1230 All users are of course welcome to discuss their issues on the users mailing
1231 list, where the developers also hang around.
1233 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1237 Please report all bugs only through our bug tracker: http://sourceforge.net/
1238 tracker/?group_id=11118&atid=111118.
1240 Before doing so, please make sure that the bug has not already been submitted
1241 and observe the additional hints at the top of the submit form.
1243 Please try to verify that it is a Privoxy bug, and not a browser or site bug
1244 first. If unsure, try toggling off Privoxy, and see if the problem persists.
1245 The appendix of the user manual also has helpful information on action
1246 debugging. If you are using your own custom configuration, please try the stock
1247 configs to see if the problem is configuration related.
1249 If not using the latest version, chances are that the bug has been found and
1250 fixed in the meantime. We would appreciate if you could take the time to
1251 upgrade to the latest version (or even the latest CVS snapshot) and verify your
1252 bug, but this is not required for reporting.
1254 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1256 6.3. Request New Features
1258 You are welcome to submit ideas on new features or other proposals for
1259 improvement through our feature request tracker at http://sourceforge.net/
1260 tracker/?atid=361118&group_id=11118.
1262 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1264 6.4. Report Ads or Other Actions-Related Problems
1266 Please send feedback on ads that slipped through, innocent images that were
1267 blocked, and any other problems relating to the default.action file through our
1268 actions feedback mechanism located at http://www.privoxy.org/actions/. On this
1269 page, you will also find a bookmark which will take you back there from any
1270 troubled site and even pre-fill the form!
1272 New, improved default.action files will occasionally be made available based on
1273 your feedback. These will be announced on the ijbswa-announce list and
1274 available from our the files section of our project page.
1276 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1280 For any other issues, feel free to use the mailing lists. Technically
1281 interested users and people who wish to contribute to the project are also
1282 welcome on the developers list! You can find an overview of all Privoxy-related
1283 mailing lists, including list archives, at: http://sourceforge.net/mail/?
1286 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1288 7. Privoxy Copyright, License and History
1290 Copyright © 2001, 2002 by Privoxy Developers <developers@privoxy.org>
1292 Some source code is based on code Copyright © 1997 by Anonymous Coders and
1293 Junkbusters, Inc. and licensed under the GNU General Public License.
1295 Portions of this document are "borrowed" from the original Junkbuster (tm) FAQ,
1296 and modified as appropriate for Privoxy.
1298 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1302 Privoxy is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the
1303 terms of the GNU General Public License, version 2, as published by the Free
1304 Software Foundation.
1306 This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY
1307 WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A
1308 PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details, which
1309 is available from the Free Software Foundation, Inc, 59 Temple Place - Suite
1310 330, Boston, MA 02111-1307, USA.
1312 You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with
1313 this program; if not, write to the
1316 Foundation, Inc. 59 Temple Place - Suite 330
1317 Boston, MA 02111-1307
1320 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1324 In the beginning, there was the Internet Junkbuster, by Anonymous Coders and
1325 Junkbusters Corporation. It saved many users a lot of pain in the early days of
1326 web advertising and user tracking.
1328 But the web, its protocols and standards, and with it, the techniques for
1329 forcing users to consume ads, give up autonomy over their browsing, and for
1330 spying on them, kept evolving. Unfortunately, the Internet Junkbuster did not.
1331 Version 2.0.2, published in 1998, was (and is) the last official release
1332 available from Junkbusters Corporation. Fortunately, it had been released under
1333 the GNU GPL, which allowed further development by others.
1335 So Stefan Waldherr started maintaining an improved version of the software, to
1336 which eventually a number of people contributed patches. It could already
1337 replace banners with a transparent image, and had a first version of pop-up
1338 killing, but it was still very closely based on the original, with all its
1339 limitations, such as the lack of HTTP/1.1 support, flexible per-site
1340 configuration, or content modification. The last release from this effort was
1341 version 2.0.2-10, published in 2000.
1343 Then, some developers picked up the thread, and started turning the software
1344 inside out, upside down, and then reassembled it, adding many new features
1347 The result of this is Privoxy, whose first stable release, 3.0, was released
projects / privoxy.git / blob