Do you want to know why I love Firefox? Because it offers the ability to set things up so you can do stuff that none of the other browsers can do, especially Chrome because, well, Chrome doesn’t want you to do any of what I’m about to share with you.
I’m going to share 3 scripts I use to alter Google searches. These modify the Google page as well as hides information Google tracks on you. To use these scripts, you first have to add an extension called Greasemonkey, which I’ve talked about in the past. These scripts, created by other users, then allow you do alter things like what I’m about to share with you.
The first script is something called Hide Google Sidebar. You know how they added that thing that pushes all your information to the right? I hate that thing, and this script will make sure that doesn’t ever bother you again. Of course, I found that I liked being able to access in the past when searching for images (such as looking for images of a certain size), but I can deal with not being able to do that anymore.
The second script is called Remove Google Search Ads. You know those Google ads that you’re always getting served on the right side? I don’t see any of that. Yeah, I know they really want me to see those things, but I’m not in the mood to have them on my search page. I see them in so many other places, and I want to see my entire screen with just the links to websites I’m looking at.
This leads me to the last one, and this one’s a doozy. The script is called Don’t Track Me Google and it’s a very interesting script. I’ll explain it this way. Go do a Google search for anything.
When the page comes up, right click on the link, slide down and copy the link location, then paste that link into your Notepad application, or any other text program you have. You’ll see a whole bunch of stuff that’s not quite the link the Google page tells you that you’re going to. That’s actually how Google tracks where you’re going when you go to a page from their search engine. That’s how they know if someone that ends up clicking on an ad came from the search, which they get paid more money for and thus pays publishers (writers; that be us lol) more, and that’s also how they start determining what ads to show you.
When you add this last script, if you right click and copy the link you’ll see the same link the search page is showing you, nothing else added. Now they can’t track you; neat eh? You have to know that they still keep records of stuff you’re searching; no getting around that. But it’s something different than tracking where you’re going from their site.
That’s that; you now have a bit more control over your workspace and your privacy. You can thank me later. 🙂
