[nyx]

Agree that "control" is a much better framing, since it doesn't suggest a need for secrecy and therefore embarrassing/unacceptable/untoward behavior that needs to stay behind drawn window blinds. I'm also fond of "agency" and "digital self-sovereignty" as alternatives.

But fine, I'll be the one to say it: Cloudflare isn't one of the good guys here and as an entity it shouldn't be trusted. It doesn't matter how pure their stated motives appear to be now, or how unmarred their track record is so far. It's a corporation that has control over an ever-increasing share of internet infrastructure, and is susceptible to the same risks as any other tech monopolist basket that we all decide to put our eggs in. Maybe more risky than the others, given how deep in the stack its influence is buried.

What happens when a government forces it to NXDOMAIN porn or put nuisance captchas in front of dissident blogs? Is there some reason people think this one is different?

[bossyTeacher]

This is a case of "When your salary depends on believing one thing, you better believe it.". OP works for Cloudflare and that is blinding his views sadly.

I 100% agree, any entity with a significantly large control of the internet cannot be trusted. And the lower in the stack the smaller the control portion needed for distrust.

[Toidiu]

Thank you for reading!

I added a disclaimer to the DNS section along with a list of other DNS providers folks can choose to use instead.

I made these choices before I was employed by Cloudflare and personally like how transparently they operate as a company. They have earned my trust but I don't expect others to feel the same way.

[ccakes]

> Cloudflare isn't one of the good guys here

Came here to say the same thing, post was interesting until I got to that point.

> nuisance captchas

Try using the internet outside of the western world and major hubs. Cloudflare make it so painful with captchas and browser integrity checks

[mac-attack]

The article definitely took a sharp and unexpected left towards the end.

[crapple8430]

> What happens when

Not even this. If you do what OP says on the firefox, and turn on ResistFingerprinting, you'd be seeing many Cloudflare captchas a day. In effect it directly punishes you having any privacy or control. I wonder if they have an internal whitelist for employees? /s