5 ms·

You might have misread. My proposal is an alternative to inferring user preferences based on their search history.

by jbay808 6y ago

867-5309 6y ago
any type of profiling, opt-in or not, may be used to identify users
- jbay808 6y ago
  I mean, hacker news can probably also identify users based on which articles they click on, and how often they jump straight to the comments. I hope they don't. But a system such as I'm describing is probably the only one that can be entirely consistent with the two disparate requirements of fully anonymizing users, and being useful to both programmers and ophiologists studying different things called "python".
  - 867-5309 6y ago
    what you are describing is relevance based on user input (be that cookies, search history, interests, a preference for x over y) that may be used as identifying information, which vastly de-anonymises the service. if a search query is too ambiguous then it can be refined. if the user knows they want a programming language and not a snake, they can let the search engine know themselves. don't sacrifice their anonymity for perceived usefulness
    - jbay808 6y ago
      Presumably, the most common search preference lists would be used by very large numbers of people -- for example, almost all programmers would rather see Python (language) queries over Python (snake) queries and would probably all be using whichever search preferences become the most popular and well-maintained, like "mit_cs_club.json". A subset of those would also be into anime and enable their anime search preferences (probably more particular), and some of them will also like mountaineering, pottery, and baking, and will have such preferences configured as well. Yes that might be enough to identify you (just like searching for your own name would be) but those preferences don't need to be attached to you, just your query, and you could disable or enable any of them at any time. It would basically be like sending a search query in this form: "Python importerror help --prefs={mit_cs_club, studioghiblifans_new, britains_best_baking_prefs, AlpineMountaineersIntl}" If you like baking, anime, and mountaineering, it's probably convenient to leave all those active for your searches, even your purely programming-focused searches. But you could toggle some of them off if articles about "helping to protect imported mountain pythons" are interfering with your search results, or if you want to be more anonymous. If you're especially paranoid you could even throw in a bunch of random preferences that don't affect your query but do throw off attempts to profile you. You could pretty easily write a script that salts every search with a few extra random preference lists, for privacy or just for fun, and make that an additional feature. The tool doesn't need to maintain any history of your past activity to cater to your search, so I think it would be a good thing for privacy overall.
      - 867-5309 6y ago
        > Presumably, the most common search preference lists would be used by very large numbers of people the more anonymous among us tend to opt for common IP addresses and common user agents to become the tree among the forest. adding a profile to that would, well, only add to a digital fingerprinting profile > those preferences don't need to be attached to you, just your query that's not how it works. preferences are by their nature personal. every transaction would have your interests and hobbies embedded, on top of metadata > mit_cs_club, studioghiblifans_new, britains_best_baking_prefs, AlpineMountaineersIntl you have voluntarily made yourself the birch among the ebony > If you're especially paranoid you could even throw in a bunch of random preferences that don't affect your query but do throw off attempts to profile you how would they not affect the query? they complement the query. or rather, unnecessarily accompany the query. your results depend on your input. it doesn't matter what colour glove you wear to pull the trigger if you bury the gun with the body > write a script that salts every search with a few extra random preference lists, for privacy or just for fun just the latter. fuzzing would be pointless since the engine will have already identified you by now it sounds like an annoying browser extension at best. to label it a pro-privacy tool would be ludicrous

You might have misread. My proposal is an alternative to inferring user preferences based on their search history.

867-5309 6y ago

any type of profiling, opt-in or not, may be used to identify users

jbay808 6y ago
I mean, hacker news can probably also identify users based on which articles they click on, and how often they jump straight to the comments. I hope they don't. But a system such as I'm describing is probably the only one that can be entirely consistent with the two disparate requirements of fully anonymizing users, and being useful to both programmers and ophiologists studying different things called "python".
- 867-5309 6y ago
  what you are describing is relevance based on user input (be that cookies, search history, interests, a preference for x over y) that may be used as identifying information, which vastly de-anonymises the service. if a search query is too ambiguous then it can be refined. if the user knows they want a programming language and not a snake, they can let the search engine know themselves. don't sacrifice their anonymity for perceived usefulness
  - jbay808 6y ago
    Presumably, the most common search preference lists would be used by very large numbers of people -- for example, almost all programmers would rather see Python (language) queries over Python (snake) queries and would probably all be using whichever search preferences become the most popular and well-maintained, like "mit_cs_club.json". A subset of those would also be into anime and enable their anime search preferences (probably more particular), and some of them will also like mountaineering, pottery, and baking, and will have such preferences configured as well. Yes that might be enough to identify you (just like searching for your own name would be) but those preferences don't need to be attached to you, just your query, and you could disable or enable any of them at any time. It would basically be like sending a search query in this form: "Python importerror help --prefs={mit_cs_club, studioghiblifans_new, britains_best_baking_prefs, AlpineMountaineersIntl}" If you like baking, anime, and mountaineering, it's probably convenient to leave all those active for your searches, even your purely programming-focused searches. But you could toggle some of them off if articles about "helping to protect imported mountain pythons" are interfering with your search results, or if you want to be more anonymous. If you're especially paranoid you could even throw in a bunch of random preferences that don't affect your query but do throw off attempts to profile you. You could pretty easily write a script that salts every search with a few extra random preference lists, for privacy or just for fun, and make that an additional feature. The tool doesn't need to maintain any history of your past activity to cater to your search, so I think it would be a good thing for privacy overall.
    - 867-5309 6y ago
      > Presumably, the most common search preference lists would be used by very large numbers of people the more anonymous among us tend to opt for common IP addresses and common user agents to become the tree among the forest. adding a profile to that would, well, only add to a digital fingerprinting profile > those preferences don't need to be attached to you, just your query that's not how it works. preferences are by their nature personal. every transaction would have your interests and hobbies embedded, on top of metadata > mit_cs_club, studioghiblifans_new, britains_best_baking_prefs, AlpineMountaineersIntl you have voluntarily made yourself the birch among the ebony > If you're especially paranoid you could even throw in a bunch of random preferences that don't affect your query but do throw off attempts to profile you how would they not affect the query? they complement the query. or rather, unnecessarily accompany the query. your results depend on your input. it doesn't matter what colour glove you wear to pull the trigger if you bury the gun with the body > write a script that salts every search with a few extra random preference lists, for privacy or just for fun just the latter. fuzzing would be pointless since the engine will have already identified you by now it sounds like an annoying browser extension at best. to label it a pro-privacy tool would be ludicrous