PirateBrowser is a free anonymous web browser for Windows which let’s you bypass internet censorship imposed by governments. It’s basically a fork of the Tor Project Browser Bundle, with the difference that it’s less focused on anonymity and more on circumventing censorship. What this means is that Flash, JavaScript and all the other various media plugins and scripts that are disabled inside the Tor Project’s Web Browser are available inside PirateBrowser, which means that you can for example watch YouTube videos and enjoy in full web browsing experience.
Just like the web browser of the Tor Project, PirateBrowser is based on Firefox, it’s a portable version of Firefox. Next to it you also get the Vidalia Control Panel, which is a control panel for the Tor network. As you can see from the screenshot down below and from its name, this free anonymous web browser was built with torrent censorship circumvention in mind, to allow people not just to access popular video sharing sites and social networks, but also torrents.
With privacy invasions of governments from all over the world that have been brought to light recently, and the fact that a lot of governments are blocking websites that they don’t like, a lot of people are looking for ways how to stay anonymous online and access blocked content. PirateBrowser is one such way.
Key features of PirateBrowser are:
- Free and simple to use: works right away, there’s no installation
- Makes you anonymous: uses Tor Project network to hide your identity
- Vidalia Control Panel: makes it easy to manage Tor network connection
- Full web browsing experience: Flash, Javascript, Java, media plugins
- Works with Windows: all versions of Windows starting with Windows XP
Similar software: BitTorrent Surf, Torch Browser.
Keep in mind that not all torrents, or should we say practically none at all, found on majority of popular torrent sharing websites are legal. Use it at your own risk.
How to access censored content and unblock websites with PirateBrowser: free anonymous web browser for Windows
Other than downloading, extracting and running the PirateBrowser executable, there’s nothing else that you need to do.
First the Vidalia Control Panel will come up. Once the connection is made to the Tor network, PirateBrowser will come up. Note that if you need a clean identity, you can always click on the use a New Identity button.
On the image above you can see Pirate Browser working, and not just that, but you can also see that we are browsing YouTube. This is something that’s not easy to do, or should we say not at all possible to do inside the browser that you get with the Tor Bundle.
Conclusion
PirateBrowser is very easy to use, and it is perfect for everyone who needs to access YouTube videos that are blocked in their country, torrent websites, again if they are blocked in your country, and so on. There’s practically no additional setup that’s required, just one click and everything should start working right away. It’s very fast and secure.
