Which one is recommended? What are the advantages and disadvantages of each? Are there better alternatives?
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TrackerControl is a ripoff of NetGuard.
Does NetGuard show me the same information TrackerControl does and vice versa?
Not exactly. TC added the ability to block trackers. NG can easily do that by using a hosts file. I used to use the file by OSID but the Hagezi files https://github.com/hagezi/dns-blocklists#readme Are much better.
Well, i don’t know the answer. But i think you need to provide more info here about what you’re trying to do here… Do you want an adblocker? Something to suppress trackers? Something that prevents your TV to send telemetry home to its manufacturer? Something so your ISP can’t see which sites you visit? Do you want an android app? Something you can install on your home router or raspberry pi? Just a plain DNS service for your windows network settings?
Mostly I try to secure my Android phone. I know that I cannot have a VPN and a firewall running at the same time (why Googla hasn’t gotten that right yet is beyond me). Hopefully Rethink will do this at some point. No ads and tracking protection are a must. Android allows to set a private DNS natively, so an app is not a must, but if it offers an advantage I will do it (e.g. NetGuard + Private DNS or just Rethink).
You can get some of this with a pi hole/vpn setup. There’s actually a really nice one you can get as a droplet (basically a virtual machine) on Digital Ocean.
https://marketplace.digitalocean.com/apps/pi-hole-vpn
Once it’s up and running it can be a full tunnel vpn or just a dns solution (also over a split tunnel vpn).
Might not give the full tracking protection exactly but will kill most ads.
Alright. ‘pi hole’ is something i tried. and ‘adguard home’. But this doesn’t really fulfill the requirements if you want something for your android phone.
i think installing adguard-home dns, a firewall and vpn endpoint on a v-server and then connecting with your phone to the vpn would solve all issues. including firewall and dns at the same time (because then it runs on your server). but you’d invent and maintain a whole privacy service yourself.
if you don’t want all of that, you’re probably better off using an existing service or app.
AdGuard DNS and NextDNS both do the same thing, there’s some differences but they’re pretty much the same (except AdGuard public DNS that doesn’t need configuration). Rethink is the same but doesn’t require an account. Rethink and TrackerControl are also Android apps that give you control over traffic locally. It depends on what you’re trying to do but any of the DNS options (AdGuard, NextDNS, Rethink) will protect multiple devices.
used all of them apart from rethink, so I can’t really give you advice on it.
That said, don’t bother with tracker control. It’s very clunky, needs the vpn slot to work and it’s more prone to break stuff than a DNS, while also blocking less.
Between adguard and nextdns I recommend adguard, because for the same price you get a VPN along with the DNS. You can get the 5 year VPN plan from adguard’s official stacksocial.com account (which I won’t link to not being accused by some idiot of being an adguard salesperson) for 50 bucks. The DNS is bundled with the VPN.
Adguard has a good reputation in the privacy community and hasn’t stepped in any controversy so far. Their VPN is not available on linux, but if you’re ok with that definitely go for it.
