Feature added in Brave Browser version 0.11.6

Sep 3, 2016 00:45 GMT  ·  By

Brandon Eich, JavaScript's creator and former Mozilla CEO, introduced yesterday a new version of the Brave web browser, a product he's developing at his new company Brave Software.

Eich announced that Brave version 0.11.6 added a new feature called Payments, which allows Brave browser users to donate money anonymously to the sites they love.

Brave, which comes with a built-in ad blocker, prevents websites from monetizing their userbases. Eich says that the new Brave Payments feature will allow users to give back to the sites they love.

Brave lets users send Bitcoin to the sites they like

The new feature is found in Brave's Settings section, under the Payments tab. By default, Brave Payments are turned off.

Once the user turns the feature on, they'll have to click a button to create a Bitcoin wallet. Brave Software said they'd be working together with BitGo to support the wallet's creation process.

Users then need to add funds to their accounts by buying Bitcoin. Brave uses the Coinbase Buy Widget to let users purchase Bitcoin with just a few buttons.

Brave doesn't collect user data, all micro-payments are anonymized

As the user surfs the Internet, Brave will gather statistics on the sites they visit. This data is stored locally, on the user's PC, and never sent to Brave servers, Eich says.

Once they're ready, the user can use these statistics to donate small amounts of Bitcoin to the sites they regularly visit.

The user can give any sum they wish to any sites they desire, based on their preferences. Brave Payments is not an obligatory feature in order to use the browser, and users can ignore it if they chose so.

Eich also said that user privacy is respected. He revealed that Brave would be using the Anonize protocol and the Private Internet Access project to mask the user's IP and anonymize the Bitcoin micro-transactions.

"We believe Brave Payments will also help reform the ad-tech ecosystem by giving both browser users and website content creators the fair deal that they deserve, based on ownership of their data," Eich explained.

Brave Payments feature
Brave Payments feature
Brave Payments feature
Brave Payments feature

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