Opera Sold
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rebelwolf4622 last edited by
I just found out that opera sold a portion of its product to qihoo 360 search and security. For me this is a little concerning given qihoo 360's shady business. What does this mean for opera? Will opera users security and privacy now be at risk?
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A Former User last edited by
It might be worth your while to go back and read through the thread. The bottom line seems to be: we don't know. To date there is no indication that our security is at risk but there are many (like myself) who are waiting on the sidelines for things to develop. I refuse to use Opera as my default browser (i.e. meaning financial transactions) until I have more evidence that things are secure. As I've been discussing with Leo and others, there is no way to determine this other than to take them at their word at this juncture. It's really too early in the game to make a definitive decision. I'm currently using Vivaldi for all of my needs and actually finding it reminiscent of the older Opera. Time will tell.
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leocg Moderator Volunteer last edited by
I just found out that opera sold a portion of its product to qihoo 360 search and security.
Not exactly. The part of Opera that makes the browser was acquired by a fund/consortium in which Qihoo partcipates.
What does this mean for opera? Will opera users security and privacy now be at risk?
This have been discussed since the beginning of this thread, maybe you should read it from the start if you haven't done yet.
Like was said, it's would be very difficult - not to say impossible - for Opera or any browser to include some kind of spying code without being noticed. However there isn't any (easy) way to prove it so it would depend on you to believe on it or not.
I personally believe that it may be more easy to put a back-door in some hardware to spy on people.
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A Former User last edited by
You know, Leo, you just got me thinking. I have a Lenovo Carbon X1 ThinkPad made in... uh... China! LOL
And here I am worried that Opera may be spying on me when in fact it would be easier to insert the code into the hardware I'm using. It seems a little ironic, doesn't it.
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leocg Moderator Volunteer last edited by
And here I am worried that Opera may be spying on me when in fact it would be easier to insert the code into the hardware
And they don't even need to do it with a hardware in our computer or in our home, they can just do it with a hardaware used by our ISP like a router and capture everyone's traffic.
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blackbird71 last edited byFor all of us, it comes down to trust: who do we trust and why? The level of trust we extend and under what conditions are usually driven by what we're trying to protect - or protect against. For most users, the practical importance of software-suite code integrity/tightness against criminal hacking attacks far outweighs the real-world risks of nation-state planting of snooping code modules within a commercial program on their system. Criminal hackers can make profitable use of personal data from nearly anyone in the world whose data they can successfully access; nation-states typically have far more selective needs and purposes for acquiring personal data.
In other words, I'm much more concerned with the security of my software code against criminal hacking exploits than I am worried about nation-state penetrations of my system. Were I engaged in criminal actions, a member of an oppressed national people-group, or involved in national-security work, my perspective obviously might differ somewhat. But as has been pointed out, there are other much more productive mechanisms for nation-states to exploit for the data they seek rather than tapping into the general public's commercial software: embedded hardware, ISPs, Internet backbones/trunks, microwave links, etc, etc.
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A Former User last edited by
Blackbird, this makes sense. My own particular concern is more related to Qihoo given its past actions. I'm not as bothered by the nation of China itself but rather the consortium that now owns Opera. And yes, it does seem to boil down to trust. With whom do you place your trust? Some argue that placing their trust in Kaspersky is fool-hearty.
Leo demonstrates his trust by using Opera for financial transactions. Do you? I'm just curious mind you.
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A Former User last edited by
Leo, on a personal note, do you use any other browsers or is Opera your sole browser? I know you've been extremely active in helping with Opera support for many years now. Were you an Opera user back in its Presto days?
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blackbird71 last edited by
Blackbird, ... Leo demonstrates his trust by using Opera for financial transactions. Do you? I'm just curious mind you.
My own situation is not very typical for normal users. Because I routinely handle sensitive data online involving other persons and entities, I almost always use Firefox specifically for financial transactions, and have done so for years. However, a large part of the reason for that is because full, immediate, glitch-free website compatibility at almost any site is virtually guaranteed for Firefox; a lesser reason for it is because I personally feel that I can clear Firefox of any and all browser-stored data/history fragments more securely and easily after a session than with many other modern browsers.
In the rather few personal transactions I've done outside of Firefox, I have used both Opera and Vivaldi with no real qualms about their security. Alternatively, most of my routine, non-sensitive online activity is done using only Vivaldi and Opera, with almost none of that kind of activity being done on Firefox.
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leocg Moderator Volunteer last edited by
do you use any other browsers or is Opera your sole browser?
I have other browsers installed but I pretty much just use Opera. Eventually I use the other browsers to check a page or if a page doesn't work fine in Opera.
Were you an Opera user back in its Presto days?
Well, I've been using Opera since version 3.5x so I guess the answer is yes.
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A Former User last edited by
I don't know how this thread was hijacked into this silliness but I wonder if we could pull it back onto the topic of Opera's ownership and the ramifications.
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g0rg0us last edited by
I don't know how this thread was hijacked into this silliness
Well, this is a speciality of @joshl ...
Not sure why someone respectable like @blackbird71 responded to it though.
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leocg Moderator Volunteer last edited by
I don't know how this thread was hijacked into this silliness
It's the Lounge, a little bit of off-topic is allowed.
Well, this is a speciality of @joshl ...
Not sure why someone respectable like @blackbird71 responded to it though.So you joined just for it? Not a good start for sure.
Well, let's go back to our normal programming.
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blackbird71 last edited by
You didn't hover on the image, did you?
No, I didn't hover on it - I wanted to avoid those fangs as much as possible.
The 'microwave links' term I noted earlier referred to the data links used by certain telecoms for relaying some of their traffic, most typically in areas where cables or fiber are too costly to lay (high-rise urban, rural swamps, mountains, etc). You've perhaps seen the large towers with heavy-duty antennae on them. The moment data traffic goes off into the 'ether' by radio/micro-wave, it becomes essentially a directed broadcast - anyone relatively near the path line-of-sight can intercept it, the only challenge then being to break the signal encryption (if any). Moreover, that interception potential exists between every tower along the full relay path, often comprising hundreds of miles - assuming, of course, that the snooper hasn't placed interception gear directly into one of the tower's relay equipment itself. -
Deleted User last edited by
HI all i'm new here i was going to install opera i asked the people at opera they assured me its safe to use, whats your all take on it before i install this program for a secondary browser?? thanks for any feedback you can provide.
