3 ms·
In theory you can track individual devices in a household instead of grouping everyone in one house, small business, building, etc. as one IP. Currently, even
by djsumdog 8y ago
In theory you can track individual devices in a household instead of grouping everyone in one house, small business, building, etc. as one IP.
Currently, even with the limitations of IPv4, most trackers can use cookies and browser fingerprints (your browser's headers, fonts, etc.) to individually identify you even behind NAT. But with IPv6, ad engines could potentially identify that you're running two different browsers on the same laptop or device, and associate both of those browsers to _you_ (some type of single targeting profile).
They also have a more precise way to track you without a browser fingerprint.
- corobo 8y agoThis is likely why the GDPR considers IP addresses as personal data. Oddly enough it's always (in my experience) the tech types that have argued against IP addresses being personal, forgetting that we might one day switch to IPv6
- stephen_g 8y agoNote that 95% of people browsing with IPv6 are probably using SLAAC with privacy extensions, so all your devices IPs should be frequently changing (at least every day, but you can lower the timeout). Only the subnet would stay the same, similar to a NAT’ed IP.
- spystath 8y agoAs it's evident from NAT they can track even behind a single IPv4. As long they know your prefix the privacy extensions don't really help. Of course one could have a dynamic prefix similar to dynamic IPs residential ISPs use. It's funny, in the past a static IP was considered a valuable feature for a residential internet connection. Nowadays, I'm wondering if dynamic IPs are more viable from a privacy perspective.