Cheers Aardvark, used Adblock plus and it seems to of worked.

As you might remember I have an ancient laptop using Win7 so am keen to keep it going as securely as possible..
I looked into Brave earlier this year and was quite keen until I came across various articles which made me think hard.
Then I came across this ..
www.spacebar.news/p/stop-using-brave-browser#:~:text=Brave%20was%20also%20caught%20up,revenue%20from%20signups%20or%20purchases.

It's quite a long read and I don't know if it's right, biased or plain wrong but ..

The tactics described in excruciatingly boring detail in the link don't affect the functionality of the browser and I haven't the time or inclination to vet the people who are associated with them. I have several browsers installed and can call up Firefox, Chrome, or Epic when in the mood. I have tried Vivaldi and Opera and liked them but they became a bit "buggy" and didn't work with one or two extensions I like to use so I deleted them. I have a feeling most all browsers are exploiting us in some way, the most obvious by grabbing as much of our personal data, browsing habits, and shopping history as they can to sell on to third parties. You can add various extensions to them to increase privacy if you like but so many people couldn't give a toss about privacy anyway so the people that run the browsers carry on doing it.

Apart from Adblock and Privacy Badger I don't waste too much time worrying about this wholesale exploitation and I have yet to spot any "personalised" ads popping up on any of the browsers I have used. I always have the browser set to block all but essential cookies and delete them (and my browsing history) when it is closed. People need to realise that Microsoft itself is a master of this sort of thing and they have been logging our online activity on our own computers for years.

What goes on with "smart" phones is largely a mystery to me but I suspect it is also dodgy. From personal experience I have noticed "apps" being installed from somewhere without my knowledge that might be stopped or disabled but can't be removed permanently. As a result we only turn it on when needed and don't give our number to anyone.

We have a Motorola Moto G which was the cheapest we could find that had the wifi calling function. That means it can get an incoming signal via our Orange router because there is no mobile network coverage here. We don't use it away from home at all and can't do any internet browsing because there is no keyboard to enter the search box as well as being too small to read a web page without a magnifying glass. We can't add any "apps" because it wants us to sign up for a Google account first which I refuse to do on privacy grounds. Pretty much a waste of money.