4 ms·
Using the IP address & user agent alone already gives you nearly 100 % accuracy, so the fact that they can re-identify you when these things stay identical isn'
by ThePhysicist 4y ago
Using the IP address & user agent alone already gives you nearly 100 % accuracy, so the fact that they can re-identify you when these things stay identical isn't surprising at all. I tested that website as well and if you take care to rotate your IP address their re-identification rate becomes abysmal, especially if you're using a privacy-focused browser and extensions like Privacy Badger / uBlock.
- misja111 4y agoExactly. IP address identification is the elephant in the room that the article just briefly mentions. Nearly all websites that want to target adds to you use that. It's just so simple to use, you can't switch it off like you can with cookies, except of course by using a VPN but almost nobody does that.
- ridgered4 4y agoI often see the narrative on here that consumer VPN providers are almost useless for privacy due to other fingerprinting methods, which I've never really bought.
- tejohnso 4y agoI just tested at fingerprint.com using mullvad. Brave browser, no VPN, they recorded one visit, one IP. Brave browser, no VPN, incognito, they recorded two visits, one IP. Brave browser, with VPN, incognito, recorded three visits, two IPs. I'm pretty impressed / surprised. A fresh incognito session, through a VPN, still matched the same fingerprint. Especially surprising since TFA indicates Brave randomizes the fingerprint. I even changed my fingerprint block setting to "strict, may break sites" and it's still recording the same visitor ID from Brave, even with incognito.
- figglestar 4y agoJust tried this with VPN + firefox resist fingerprinting. I cleared cookies and session data and reloaded, it recorded 1 visit 1 ip for the first (obviously) and second tries. I did not change my VPN connection between attempts. Based on this test I'm surprised Brave's fingerprint resister did not work for you. But on firefox the enhanced privacy protection (strict) and the resistfingerprinting option are two different knobs.
- aflag 4y agoAnd if we ever migrate to ipv6, the IP alone may be all anyone needs to fingerprint you.
- bauruine 4y agoEvery device implements privacy extensions which changes the address every 24 hours. It's no longer based on the MAC and hasn't been for a long time.