Argon
What it does#
Stops sites recognising you between visits when you are not signed in.
A site does not need a cookie to know you came back. It can read your screen size, your graphics hardware, the fonts you have installed, your timezone, how your browser draws a line of text — dozens of small details that are boring on their own and, together, are close to unique. That combination is a fingerprint, and it survives clearing cookies and using a private window.
Argon substitutes those details, so the fingerprint a site computes is not the one it computed last time.
The panel#
Open it from the toolbar. It reports, for the page you are on:
- The protection level in force — the one thing on the panel that changes, which is why it is the only coloured word.
- What the page tried to read, grouped by what it was after.
- Any exception you granted this site, with a control to take it back.
The three levels#
| Standard | Full protection. Everything a fingerprint is built from is substituted. This is the normal state. |
| Compatible | Reduced, for a site that genuinely breaks under Standard. Some real values get through. |
| Off | No substitution for this site. |
Drop a site to Compatible only when it actually misbehaves. A level is remembered per site, and the panel always shows which one is in force so you never have to guess whether you are protected here.
What it cannot do#
- It cannot hide your IP address. That is what a VPN is for, and no extension can do it.
- It does not block ads or trackers — a tracker that is allowed to load can still count the visit. Pair it with Sodium.
- It does not help while you are signed in. A site you have logged into knows who you are because you told it.
What it can see#
Argon reads nothing and sends nothing. Its only stored data is the per-site levels you set, kept in the browser.