How to stay anonymous online?

If you want to be sure people can collect information about you during your online surfing there is not 36 solutions: either you do not give this information, or you made you pretending to be someone other connecting from a different location than where you are. The most reliable is obviously nothing to give but it is not always possible (an order online and you must provide an address, credit card, etc.)...

To be more discreet you need a proxy serveror a VPN (virtual private network). With the right combination you will not only be able to surf anonymously minimum but you can also access websites blocked or censored in your country.

Proxies are not really for beginners but if you have some skills with them and that you use the services Mozilla just take a look at FoxyProxy, an add-on management proxy that works with Firefox, Thunderbird, Songbird and SeaMonkey. Recent versions of Internet Explorer and Chrome have also emerged. For less than 15 euros per month you can get the paid version which will ensure a better speed, can choose which proxy passes by from the list.

If you are ready to install a program, The Onion Router (TOR famous) is a good option. it is a free network of 'tunnels' which allows you to route your web requests and surf to other places to make it as difficult as possible any identification by the final site. More concretely instead of sending information from your computer to final site, you will go through different relays: the final site will only see the last relay and no further. There is a browser version that you can install on Windows, Mac or Linux as well as a portable version for use via USB or a version of Android.

Once installed you will need to start the browser and you will see the digital control panel Vidalia TOR browser (which is a modified version of Firefox) will be available and you can start surfing. Closing the browser will return to a normal surf, your browser will not normally impacted by anonymous unless you explicitly in the options. To avoid these various manipulations there is a Firefox plugin to move more easily from one mode to the other: TorButton.

Another free way (and perhaps easier) to protect yourself is to use Hotspot Shield. A base developed to protect Wi-Fi spots this free VPN does not stop there, of course be used with any laptop or home computer. It can be installed on all machines running Windows or Mac and provides full HTTPS encryption for all pages viewed online, hide your IP address and bypass the firewall restrictions. If you are in a country blocking YouTube, Facebook or other sites, you can bypass it and access it as if you were resident elsewhere. The counterpart of this tool is to put up an advertisement window all along your surf, drawback may be partly undermines pub with a Blocker (type AdBlock for Firefox, etc.).

From a point of view there are many payment methods such protections Anonymizer Universal which offers a easy to use VPN service from $ 50 per year. Little more is that it works on Windows, Mac and even iPhone.

If you have no choice and must (for whatever reason) use a standard browser or old, consider deleting your cookies and browsing history as often as possible. Or better, use stealth mode available on most modern browsers as you have a minimum of cookies & Co. For firefox just go to Tools> Options> Privacy and check "Always use the mode Private Browsing "(enjoy it also check" Show websites do not track me "). Google Chrome just does Ctrl + Shift + N to open a private instance.

There are also browsers specifically focused on the protection of privacy, this is the case, for example Browzar that does not even require installation since it suffices to run it from an executable file to be used (thus ideal for do it from a USB key when you are traveling). Browzar uses the rendering engine of Internet Explorer but in terms safe. Other browsers such market we can also mention xB Browser, which is a component suite which XeroBank also offers VPN services and anonymous emails.

Do not hesitate to serve you so that Meta search engines like Google are not aware of what you are looking for personally. Through other engines Google ask them you dilute your footsteps. There are dozens of metasearch, some other less complete, some focus on other social research devoted to compare results from Google and Bing, etc..