Watch videos on YouTube more anonymously (Actionable Privacy Tip #2)
You can browse YouTube videos using Invidious: an 'alternative front end' that isn't filled with trackers and spyware. It also works relatively with Javascript disabled to further privacy gains. It takes 2 minutes to make this change and is worth trying to see how you get on. It can easily be reversed later, but personally I have not visited YouTube.com for months after making this change. Advanced users should try hosting their own Invidious instance for extra fun and learning.
How? 🤷♂️
A recently popularised open source script called Invidious has enabled users to watch YouTube videos more anonymously.
Invidious code is hosted on various public (and private) servers called instances. You can see a full list of Invidious instances here - I have been using Yew.tube recently.
The best way to use Invidious is to use a browser plugin that redirects all YouTube links to a chosen Invidious instance (such as Yew.tube).
To do this, I recommend the PrivacyRedirect plugin. It is open source (with 10+ contributors and 150+ stars on GitHub) and is available for Firefox, Chrome and even Microsoft Edge.
Why? 🤔
YouTube was bought by Google in 2006 and since then it has become increasingly integrated with Google's advertising and tracking businesses. Which videos you watch, how long you watch them for, what you say, where you log in from, who else logs in from the same places and more is being observed and saved to the profile Google has on you.
By using an alternative front-end, you vastly reduce the extent of this tracking as far as YouTube video watching is concerned.
What about ... ? ☝️
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Watching playlists Because you're not logging into YouTube, you can only access public playlists using Invidious. And even these I have found can be buggy - they often don't autoplay. Many invidious instances allow you to create your own account and you can recreate your playlists on a particular Invidious instance as a workaround.
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What about supporting YouTube creators? If using Invidious, you should support your favourite creators by buying merchandise, Patreon and other channels.
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Can I stop watching YouTube videos altogether? For uploads you can switch to Vimeo, but for browsing and building an audience there's little else that competes with YouTube's vast library at the moment.
Have you implemented this tip? Is there a something you strongly agree or disagree with? Share it with me by sending a quick reply to this email.