Nowadays, everyone knows how tech companies track us online and gather our data. While this is alarming, it’s not something that can be controlled unless you take action. In this post, I listed the 40 best open-source privacy tools to help you take your online privacy to the next level.
You don’t need to be a celeb or high-profile businessman to worry about your online privacy. Growing numbers of script kiddies randomly target IP, and often time they do serious damage. Using some of these tools can significantly reduce the chance of getting hacked, data stolen, or online doxing and save you money.
1. BitWarden
Bitwarden is a password manager that stores sensitive information such as website credentials in an encrypted vault. It has mobile apps and browser extensions, making generating and storing passwords easy. This service has a free plan, though a premium plan unlocks additional features such as two-factor authentication. Code
2. Aegis
Aegis Authenticator is a free, secure, and open-source app for Android to manage your 2-step verification tokens for your online services. Code
3. Padloc
Padloc is an open-source yet easy-to-use commercial cloud storage service. It helps you remember your passwords and securely stores credit cards, notes, documents, and more! Code
4. Win Auth
WinAuth is a portable, open-source Authenticator for Windows that provides counter or time-based RFC 6238 authenticators and standard implementations. Code
5. OTP Client
A highly secure and easy-to-use OTP client written in C/GTK supports both TOTP and HOTP. Available for popular Linux distros. Code
6. VeraCrypt
VeraCrypt is one of our favorite encryption tools because it’s simple to use, open source, and completely free. Unfortunately, VeraCrypt is no longer being developed, so users are highly encouraged to migrate to CipherShed. CipherShed is a fork of VeraCrypt that is actively being developed. Code
7. Cryptomator
Cryptomator is an encryption software program that encrypts files and folders sent to the cloud. It is very secure because of its 256-bit AES encryption. Code
8. Age
Age is a simple, modern, secure file encryption tool, format, and Go library. It features small explicit keys, no config options, and UNIX-style composability. Learn more about the format specification here. Age was designed by @Benjojo12 and @FiloSottile. An alternative interoperable Rust implementation is available here. Files can be encrypted to multiple recipients by repeating -r/–recipient. Code
9. LibreWolf
LibreWolf, a privacy-focused web browser, has been under development for quite some time. The latest version, LibreWolf 0.0.8, was released recently, with plenty of new features. LibreWolf aims to increase protection against tracking and fingerprinting techniques while including a few security improvements. Code
10. Tor
The Tor Browser is a free software designed to enhance online anonymity by routing your web traffic through multiple servers. These anonymous servers help mask your IP address, making it challenging to identify your location or web activity. The Tor Browser has been around for over 15 years, and millions of people use it online every day. Code
11. Bromite
Bromite is one of the most secure web browsers for Android. The main goal is to provide a no-clutter browsing experience without privacy-invasive features and with the addition of a fast ad-blocking engine. For some unknown reason, it is not published on Play Store. You can download the apk file directly from Bromite’s official website. Code
12. DuckDuckGO
DuckDuckGo is a privacy-oriented search engine, an alternative to google.com that empowers you to seamlessly take control of your web search without any tradeoffs. Code
13. Searx
Searx is a free internet metasearch engine aggregates results from more than 70 search services. It is an online tool similar to a search engine, but instead of serving up individual results, it brings together results from different search engines. This means that by searching for a single word, Searx will provide links to pages, images, and other types of media from across the web. Searx is a decentralized search engine, meaning it does not depend on any third-party host, and data is not stored on a central server. Code
14. Signal
Signal App is a great open-source tool to help protect your online privacy. This app uses end-to-end encryption to keep your messages private. It also allows you to set up self-destructing messages, so your messages will be automatically deleted after a certain period. Code
15. OpenPGP
OpenPGP is a free and open-source tool that can be used to encrypt your email messages. It uses a public key encryption system, meaning you must generate a public and private key pair. The public key can be shared with anyone, but the private key must be kept secret. Code
16. Tutanota
Tutanota is a free, open-source email service that offers end-to-end encryption to protect your privacy. Your emails are encrypted before they are even sent, meaning only the intended recipient can read them. Tutanota also offers a secure way to send encrypted attachments. Code
17. Mail Cow
Mail Cow is an open-source tool that can help to protect your online privacy. It is a self-hosted email server that you can use to send and receive emails. Mail Cow provides several features that can help to keep your emails private, including end-to-end encryption and spam filtering.
Mail Cow is an excellent option for anyone looking for an open source tool to help protect their online privacy. Code
18. FailEmail
1. FairEmail is an open-source email app that gives users control over their privacy. It allows users to set up different email accounts and manage them all in one place. It also has many privacy-focused features, such as the ability to encrypt emails and block tracking. It is available for Android. Code
19. Anonaddy
Anonaddy is a free and open-source tool that helps you protect your online privacy. It allows you to create disposable email addresses that you can use for online services. This means that your real email address is never exposed. Code
Firefox Private Relay is an extension for the Firefox web browser that encrypts your email address and routes your emails through a series of servers to help protect your privacy. It is a great way to protect your privacy online. If you are concerned about someone spying on your emails, this extension is definitely worth a try. Code
21. Torbirdy
Torbirdy is a Thunderbird add-on that uses the Tor network to hide your IP address. This means that no one can see where you’ve been or what you’re doing on the internet. Code
22. Ricochet Refresh
Ricochet Refresh is an open-source project that aims to create a new Ricochet client from scratch. The project aims to build a modern and secure chat app that will be easy to use and work on all platforms.
The new Ricochet client will be built using the latest web technologies such as React, Redux, and ES6. It will also include features not possible in the original Ricochet implementation, such as end-to-end encryption for messages and media, desktop messaging clients with support for inline media playback, and cross-device syncing of message history. Code
An email tester is a tool that tests how secure an email is. It checks for potential vulnerabilities and then gives the user a report on what has been found. Code
24. DKIM Verifier
DKIM allows domain owners to validate their email messages by confirming that they are in control of the sending host.
DKIM is a system for validating the authenticity of an email message. It does this by generating a digital signature to verify the sender’s identity and ensure that the message was not tampered with during delivery.
25. Mumble
Mumble is an open-source, low-latency, high-quality voice chat software.
Mumble is a cross-platform voice chat application that has been around for quite a while. It is an alternative to Skype, TeamSpeak, and Ventrilo. Mumble was created to be used by gamers who need to talk to each other while playing games like Counter-Strike or League of Legends.
Mumble has been adopted by some organizations and businesses as well. Companies often use it with geographically dispersed offices or teams that need to communicate regularly over long distances.
26. Silent.link
Anonymous eSIM for sending/receiving SMS, incoming calls, and 4G / 5G internet + worldwide roaming. No data is required at sign-up. Affordable pricing, with payments and top-ups accepted in BTC. Requires an eSim-compatible device.
27. RocketChat
Rocket.Chat is a web-based chat application that allows users to chat and share files with other users.
Rocket.Chat is a popular alternative to Slack, the most used team chat software for years. Rocket.Chat is an open-source project that can be downloaded for free and used in any environment. Code
28. Mattermost
Mattermost is an open-source platform that enables teams to collaborate in a secure and private environment.
Mattermost has an open-source edition, which can be self-hosted. This means you can set up your own Mattermost server on your infrastructure and data center. You will have complete control over the security and privacy of your data. Code
29. Privacy Badger
Privacy Badger is a browser extension that blocks invisible trackers embedded in the websites you visit. This extension warns you when a website tries to install tracking software and blocks those sites from loading any content or scripts. Code
Provides user control over WebRTC privacy settings in Chromium to prevent WebRTC leaks. Code
31. Canvas Fingerprint Blocker
The “Canvas Blocker (fingerprint protect)” extension prevents the HTML canvas element from generating a unique identification key to protect the user’s privacy. Code
32. ClearURLs
ClearURLs is an add-on based on the new WebExtensions technology and will automatically remove tracking elements from URLs to help protect your privacy. Code
33. LocalCDN
LocalCDN is a web browser extension that emulates Content Delivery Networks (CDNs) to improve your online privacy. It intercepts the traffic, finds supported resources locally, and injects them into the environment. This helps to prevent unnecessary 3rd party requests to Google, StackPath, MaxCDN, and other CDNs. LocalCDN is a fork of Decentraleyes and is prepared for use with uBlock Origin/uMatrix. Code
The “Self-Destructing Cookies” extension is an extension that allows you to delete cookies either when the browser is closed or when tabs are closed. Code
Highly configurable User-Agent spoofer browser extension, making it appear that you are on a different device, browser, and version to what you are actually using. Code
36. PrivacySpy
PrivacySpy is a project of Politiwatch, a registered 501(c)(3) organization. The extension shows a score for the privacy policy of the current website. Code
37. Flagfox
Flagfox is a browser extension that displays a flag icon indicating the current webserver’s physical location of the website you visited.
38. Orbot
Orbot is a free app from The Guardian Project that empowers other apps on your device to use the internet more securely. Orbot uses Tor to encrypt your Internet traffic and hide it by bouncing through a series of computers worldwide. Code
39. CamWings
CamWings prevent background processes from gaining unauthorized access to your device’s camera on Andriod. Better still, use a webcam sticker.
40. Xumi Security
Xumi Security is a mobile app that gives users control over their device security. It resolves known security vulnerabilities. It is useful to ensure that certain apps or device settings are not putting your security or privacy at risk.
Thanks for reading the post; I hope you found it helpful.
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