> The source page does not have any access to referral data. The source page determines the target of the link and can add whatever tracking data they want to

> The source page does not have any access to referral data. The source page determines the target of the link and can add whatever tracking data they want to it. You can see from the link target that it's going back to the same site. That is all they need to get the referral data. > It does not _reduce_ the number of sites that gets tracking data. It does, as the source page has the tracking data either way but the publisher's page does not if SE is used. Frankly I'd rather trust Google with that data—they have access to it anyway, through several different channels—than a bunch of publishers I have no other relationship with. > Unless SE ultimately allows specification of a list of allowed distributors as part of the bundle, … It won't matter if the bundle contains a list of "allowed distributors" if user agents don't enforce that restriction. And why would they? They know the content is correct regardless of where it came from due to the signature. Refusing the data won't improve privacy at all, as the server already knows that the link was followed. The only one seeing any benefit here is the publisher, who would get tracking data at the expense of the user's privacy. The user agent doesn't represent the publisher, it represents the user.