However, new data is provided to
TechRadar Pro
by Digital intelligence platform SimilarWeb says privacy-focused veteran browser
Firefox browser and opera is procrastination. A rough estimate of Opera’s user acquisition rate (based on browser install page traffic) shows that June was a particularly low point, down 23.1% Growth rate since the beginning of the year. There have been some small improvements since then, but Opera seems less and less attractive to new users. Meanwhile, Firefox is doing worse, perhaps by deciding to focus on
Mozilla VPN and Other Privacy Products. In August, the number of visits to the browser installation page was down 7% from January, and its market share (opens in new tab) (used to be 30%) has dropped to just 3.35%. Raw data shows that Firefox currently only attracts a few hundred thousand new users per month, while Opera attracts about 2 million users. However, market leader Google Chrome is believed to be used by over 3.1 billion people (opens in new tab) people. The rise of the “big default browser” The data published by SimilarWeb coincides with Report
(Opens in a new tab), published by Mozilla in late September 2022, accuses Google, Microsoft and Apple of “abusing their privileged positions” to make it “hard or impossible for users” Possibly” to change the browser settings to be defaulted by the operating system. This year has been with
EU antitrust legislation
targets Google, Apple and Meta’s control over browsers, search engines and other markets. Google also recently failed to overturn a €4.34 billion antitrust fine is related to restricting Android device makers to “consolidate their search engine dominance” ”, according to a spokesman for the EU General Court of Justice. Both Google Chrome and Microsoft Edge are very popular defaults that depend almost entirely on brand recognition and their state actions as multiple default options System(Chrome on Chrome OS and Android and Edge on Windows 11). Other “big defaults” include macOS and iOS versions of Safari .
“default setting Can be a burden on consumers who prefer to use a browser other than their default but cannot or do not know how to change their default browser. We know from our research that some consumers employ unnecessarily cumbersome workarounds to stick with them preferences,” Mozilla reports.
Mozilla’s report provides some explanation as to why system providers pursue such tactics, claiming “big defaults” “The developers of browsers can profit from user data. “While consumers don’t pay to use a browser, their browsing history is important for ads like Meta, Amazon, Google and Microsoft It’s valuable data for business platforms. It’s no coincidence that many of these companies have yet to implement robust anti-tracking technology in their browsers or deprecate third-party cookies,” Mozilla said.
However, the company also admits that Big Tech’s motives extend beyond data collection: the operator of the “big default” browser Users locked into its proprietary search engine provide ads to earn substantial revenue. “Google Chrome is captured by Google Search (powered by Google Ads), while Microsoft Edge is captured by Bing Search (powered by Google Ads) Supported by Microsoft Advertising). Standalone Browser is the only company that can freely consider search defaults on behalf of consumers. They are also one of the few companies that encourages the discovery, evaluation, adoption, and innovation of alternative search and advertising experiences.”
(Image credit: Shutterstock)
Browser Selection
Despite the recent struggles of companies like Mozilla and Opera, the persistent need for an “alternative” web browser has independent support from SimilarWeb data. From January to August, the privacy-focused Brave Browser saw an estimated 272% surge in monthly downloads. Granted, Brave’s install page only had 17,827 and 66,340 hits, respectively, during those months, but that’s still a significant growth rate. These numbers suggest that continued success in “big default” browsers is likely to be the result not just of suppressing alternatives, but also of user apathy and brand recognition . While Big Tech seeks pure profit, privacy-conscious browsers may just be fighting each other. The growth in Brave installs this year suggests that Mozilla Firefox and Opera are losing market share, being replaced by newer options such as Brave and DuckDuckGo’s new privacy browsers (we don’t have any data at this time). Crucially, the stats also show that the push for web browser privacy can be a small but still able to gain traction. Apple decides to let users change their default browser in iOS 14 is popular in iOS 14 fighting to get consumers to care about their online privacy, but the first step towards complete browser independence is to completely do away with the idea of defaults – if Apple is in on maintaining its own “big default”, which may never happen the most popular mobile operating system in the US .
As it stands, Mozilla may have made the mistake of assuming that every “big default” browser user is a potential convert. User indifference always falls into the hands of big corporations; even minus suppression tactics, “big default” browsers still beat independent alternatives in terms of monthly growth.
has a solution like inviting users to choose their own default browser from a list of privacy-focused alternatives, and something like this With simple, sound arguments made, this indifference may be diminished. Legislation for such a thing seems unthinkable to most lawmakers outside the EU.
Shutterstock / Robuart (Image credit: Shutterstock/Robuart)
Mozilla, DuckDuckGo, and eleven others did lobby the US Congress recently for a data privacy bill that would address Big Tech Monopoly, default browser and unrestricted data collection, but with the lobbying resources of big tech companies, the chances of getting ahead anywhere are slim.
In addition, in
U.K
and
Australia
means that legislating for online privacy and freedom of choice for anonymous browsers could be an extremely slow process, if not a completely insurmountable problem.
Privacy-centric browsers will see more and even growth if users can choose wisely between them ? The problem now is that we may never find out.
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Luke Hughes works as a graduate writer at TechRadar Pro, producing news, features and transactional content covering topics from computing to cloud services, cybersecurity, data privacy and business software.
