This seems like it will have the opposite effect: unmask folks trying to use a proxy/VPN by having them go through a Chrome proxy first. It'll also keep IP data only available to Google for tracking purposes.<p>Probably isn't a good time to being doing this and revoking third party cookies while under antitrust investigations.
This seems similar to Cloudflare + Apple partnership on <i>Private Relay</i> [0]; except the traffic first goes through Cloudflare before exiting via Apple / Akamai servers; whereas in Chrome's case, the first hop is Google themselves.<p>Apart from the all the QUIC vpn / proxy work Cloudflare et al (standardising <i>Private Relay</i>) are involved in [1][2], the OHAI working group [3] is closing in on its reviews too.<p>Interestingly, there is an active IETF draft for how such private proxies could be built: <a href="https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-iab-privacy-partitioning/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-iab-privacy-partition...</a><p>[0] <a href="https://blog.cloudflare.com/icloud-private-relay/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://blog.cloudflare.com/icloud-private-relay/</a><p>[1] <a href="https://datatracker.ietf.org/wg/masque/documents/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://datatracker.ietf.org/wg/masque/documents/</a><p>[2] <a href="https://datatracker.ietf.org/wg/privacypass/documents/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://datatracker.ietf.org/wg/privacypass/documents/</a><p>[3] <a href="https://datatracker.ietf.org/wg/ohai/documents/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://datatracker.ietf.org/wg/ohai/documents/</a>
> In order to access the proxy a user must be logged in to Chrome. To prevent abuse a Google run authentication server will grant access tokens to the Google run proxy based on a per-user quota.<p>How does this protect user privacy, overall?
As long as Google records your browser history by being logged in I don't understand the purpose because it will be avaiable to Government request or by subpoena.
Now that this has open the floodgates, where many users would be using a VPN like service shipped by default on the worlds most popular browser, one of two bad things will happen:<p>1. Cloudflare (which is proxying traffic for this feature) is unable to maintain its contact neutral status as governments force it to implement censorship to comply with local laws.<p>2. Governments force browsers to ship a block list of domains, with tampering the browser binaries being prevented by attestation (which has already been proposed in France.)
OMG!<p>"In order to access the proxy a user must be logged in to Chrome. To prevent abuse a Google run authentication server will grant access tokens to the Google run proxy based on a per-user quota."<p>In order to prevent abuse... we have to give you a tracking token, to use the "Anonymizing" network. One that tracks down to the browser level, across IP switches! Way cool!<p>Nice try Google... we've seen tracking tokens from you enough times. :)
This sounds like private relay. I love it! Really love the increasing ecosystem around protecting people from their current network. Who knows what airports and coffeeshops are doing with your traffic analytics anyways.
Something that seems to be missed in the comments is that this is not being pitched as a general purpose VPN for routing all your traffic (or even all your Chrome traffic) through. In particular:<p>> Traffic will be directed to use these proxies based on a third party list of domains.<p>Given the feature is another of the attempts at reducing cross-site tracking surface, it seems like a good guess that what the idea is to apply this specifically for domains used for that.
Oh, I wonder if this is actually the (at least short-term) motivation for Google's much-criticized WEI [1] efforts?<p>MASQUE lacking a feedback channel for websites to report spam/abuse was explicitly given as a motivation there, as far as I remember.<p>I'm still skeptical of WEI as a whole until we know more, though.<p>[1] <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_Environment_Integrity" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_Environment_Integrity</a>
> Phase 1 will use a two-hop proxy configuration to create a connection to a destination server first with a tunnel to a Google owned proxy and second to a third-party owned proxy server. The first proxy will never know the client's target destination and the second proxy will never know the client's IP address.<p>Unless they share the information with each other, which is guaranteed to be impossible... how exactly?
>Traffic will be directed to use these proxies based on a third party list of domains.<p>this is the interesting bit to me. what is the third-party list of domains? is google going to start masking IPs for traffic to some known-sketchy list of sites?
Had to double check if they are protecting IP (Internet Protocol <i>address</i>) or IP (Intellectual property) by adding some sort of filtering for copyrighted content right in the browser. In any case - nothing useful.
Tell us who you are and you will be able to access “anonymously” (wink, wink) those sites that you don’t want to disclose you visit.<p>Maybe IPs deserve more privacy than people.
iCloud Private Relay clone, implemented worse (no cryptographic privacy to the first hop, as Private Relay does it, AFAICT). Apple always does it first, and possibly best.