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Maybe I am being too naive, but could someone explain to me why just using a VPN would not be good enough to hide your traffic from these companies / government

Maybe I am being too naive, but could someone explain to me why just using a VPN would not be good enough to hide your traffic from these companies / governments? I understand that perhaps they _could_ ask the VPN provider to give logs (depending on the provider, if they keep logs or not). But that would not work for the algorithms used to target you as an individual. Could someone please explain that to me? :-)

deleted 10y ago
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jehna1 10y ago
VPN commonly only hides your IP for the time you're using it. There are many other factors that can be used to track you. First is cookies. Say you log in to Facebook with your browser from your own IP address and a hour later you fire up VPN to browse the web. One of the websites you load has Facebook's tracking pixel and - unless you cleared your cookies - boom: Facebook knows you have visited that site. Even if you clear your cookies, you may have some long-living stuff (like Flash cookies etc) that can be used to track your browser. And even if you clear everything or use incognito, sites can use some clever heuristics (CPU power, enabled plugins, timezone, browser version, webrtc, etc.) to track your browsing and to match that it's you.
- Insanity 10y ago
  Well, for the first part, just restrict internet access without turning the VPN on. (For me, I can not access any website when the VPN is not active). The last part of which you wrote is incredibly interesting. I had no idea they could find out the CPU power or the enabled plugins. Though, to be fair, I think I'd fall in a pretty large pond to match. And either way, that information does not seem very useful (to me) for targetted advertisements. Thank you for your answer :-)
  - programd 10y ago
    The EFF lets you see all the fun ways you can be tracked by your browser fingerprint: https://panopticlick.eff.org/ https://panopticlick.eff.org/
    - Neliquat 10y ago
      And yet that is a tiny fraction of fingerprinting tech. Many devs and companies roll their own as well. It is hard to anticipate or defend against all, or even most.

deleted 10y ago

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jehna1 10y ago

VPN commonly only hides your IP for the time you're using it. There are many other factors that can be used to track you. First is cookies. Say you log in to Facebook with your browser from your own IP address and a hour later you fire up VPN to browse the web. One of the websites you load has Facebook's tracking pixel and - unless you cleared your cookies - boom: Facebook knows you have visited that site. Even if you clear your cookies, you may have some long-living stuff (like Flash cookies etc) that can be used to track your browser. And even if you clear everything or use incognito, sites can use some clever heuristics (CPU power, enabled plugins, timezone, browser version, webrtc, etc.) to track your browsing and to match that it's you.

Insanity 10y ago
Well, for the first part, just restrict internet access without turning the VPN on. (For me, I can not access any website when the VPN is not active). The last part of which you wrote is incredibly interesting. I had no idea they could find out the CPU power or the enabled plugins. Though, to be fair, I think I'd fall in a pretty large pond to match. And either way, that information does not seem very useful (to me) for targetted advertisements. Thank you for your answer :-)
- programd 10y ago
  The EFF lets you see all the fun ways you can be tracked by your browser fingerprint: https://panopticlick.eff.org/ https://panopticlick.eff.org/
  - Neliquat 10y ago
    And yet that is a tiny fraction of fingerprinting tech. Many devs and companies roll their own as well. It is hard to anticipate or defend against all, or even most.