Introduction

Every developer has at least heard of JavaScript. The dreaded language that runs a lot of the internets logic. But did you know that it harbors great peril for not just developers, but also normal end users, no matter which system they all run. This danger comes from so-called “non-free JavaScript-implementations”.

Digital Slaves

This non-free JavaScript does, first and foremost, a lot of things. Among the most harmful are Telemetry, Espionage, and many more. These practices harm the end user in many different ways.

Telemetry is the process of collecting user data for the sake of creating a “usage profile” of a certain user, and therefore making targeted advertising a lot easier. This is often embedded in a non-free JavaScript.

General data collection, which I tend to call Espionage, is often used in tandem with Telemetry, to get all the information the government (or other companies) may want from an end user. Both Espionage and Telemetry-Scripts have the tendency to “phone home”, and secretly send all the data over to servers running proprietary software, which are used to process heaps of stolen data.

Since data is one of the most powerful resources available in the digital age, these companies have a stranglehold over what we want and don’t want, effectively turning us into digital slaves.

How to circumvent this

There are mainly 3 ways to prevent this. The first method would be to outright ban the internet from your life. This might be good for your psyche, but you will look like some hobo outcast when you do it. The second way would be to just ban any and all JavaScript from your browsing. This is a good idea, but not the best, since it prevents you from visiting most modern websites. The last method would be to block only non-free Javascript. This would open up a few more websites, as well as allow you to whitelist trivial scripts, even if non-free. There is a browser extension for this, that does exactly that.

Conclusion

Blocking non-free JavaScript is a good way to reclaim your freedom on the internet. The better it becomes when you realize that the websites of all the big data thieves become virtually unusable.