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If you routinely clear your cookies, does that protect you from long term tracking?

wat10000 1y ago
Fingerprinting is an active area of research (both attack and defense), so the answer is, maybe, depending on just how unique your setup is. EFF has a nice demo that will try to fingerprint you and tell you how trackable you are based on non-cookie data: https://coveryourtracks.eff.org https://coveryourtracks.eff.org Of course, new techniques are invented all the time, so that may not cover everything.
- blindriver 1y ago
  Unless they are targeting a specific individual for spying purposes, is there any benefit to doing such deep fingerprinting at the individual level, given that multiple people might use the same computer? It seems like knowing every single thing done at that computer may be too much information that might not have value but having more broad-based tracking patterns would be cheaper and more profitable, no?
  - wat10000 1y ago
    Advertisers say that the better they can target advertisements, the more valuable they are. If so, then every bit of fingerprinting helps. Maybe multiple people use a computer which degrades it for those particular people, but then many other computers are used by only one person, so it's helpful in aggregate. I'm skeptical this actually works, given the atrocious quality of ads that I see when they sneak past my ad blocker, but that's what they say.
cookiengineer 1y ago
Not if you use Chrome 135 or later, which is every browser now except Firefox/LibreWolf. Federated Learning of Cohorts (FLOC) proved that cookies aren't actually necessary to track you with 98%+ precision, which, given how the internet works, is just 2 clicks. The only way to stay anonymous is to stay on the radar. Sandbox your browser, have multiple physical-on-the-filesystem profiles and never mix business with pleasure or banking with youtube. If you use Linux, create a Windows 11 VM to browse anonymously. Because Linux makes you already stick out as a sore thumb due to its TCP fingerprint.
- codedokode 1y ago
  Won't VM be detected by GPU name which is exposed by WebGL and similar technologies? What computer has a GPU with a name like "QEMU GPU"? If you do that, at least change GPU name to NVIDIA or something.

Fingerprinting is an active area of research (both attack and defense), so the answer is, maybe, depending on just how unique your setup is. EFF has a nice demo that will try to fingerprint you and tell you how trackable you are based on non-cookie data: https://coveryourtracks.eff.org https://coveryourtracks.eff.org Of course, new techniques are invented all the time, so that may not cover everything.

blindriver 1y ago
Unless they are targeting a specific individual for spying purposes, is there any benefit to doing such deep fingerprinting at the individual level, given that multiple people might use the same computer? It seems like knowing every single thing done at that computer may be too much information that might not have value but having more broad-based tracking patterns would be cheaper and more profitable, no?
- wat10000 1y ago
  Advertisers say that the better they can target advertisements, the more valuable they are. If so, then every bit of fingerprinting helps. Maybe multiple people use a computer which degrades it for those particular people, but then many other computers are used by only one person, so it's helpful in aggregate. I'm skeptical this actually works, given the atrocious quality of ads that I see when they sneak past my ad blocker, but that's what they say.

cookiengineer 1y ago

Not if you use Chrome 135 or later, which is every browser now except Firefox/LibreWolf. Federated Learning of Cohorts (FLOC) proved that cookies aren't actually necessary to track you with 98%+ precision, which, given how the internet works, is just 2 clicks. The only way to stay anonymous is to stay on the radar. Sandbox your browser, have multiple physical-on-the-filesystem profiles and never mix business with pleasure or banking with youtube. If you use Linux, create a Windows 11 VM to browse anonymously. Because Linux makes you already stick out as a sore thumb due to its TCP fingerprint.

codedokode 1y ago
Won't VM be detected by GPU name which is exposed by WebGL and similar technologies? What computer has a GPU with a name like "QEMU GPU"? If you do that, at least change GPU name to NVIDIA or something.