13 ms·

I don't really like this. I work in the advertising industry and retargeting is honestly one of the most exciting things to come out. Sure there are ways of co

by chewxy 14y ago

I don't really like this. I work in the advertising industry and retargeting is honestly one of the most exciting things to come out. Sure there are ways of cookieless retargeting, but it is a hassle. I mean, everyone's heard of Samy's Evercookie right? Then there are TCP stack signatures, and other companies like a few European DSPs that use cookieless tracking to track a person (IMO it's quite easy to use a GET pixel to actually capture a person's TCP stack). You can use 3rd party cookies for good and evil. For example, for my personal project, Fork the Cookbook (http://forkthecookbook.com http://forkthecookbook.com) I'm working on using pixel drops to track how many people fork recipes from embedded recipes (how else would one measure success of an idea). Most analytics softwares like Google Analytics uses 3rd party cookies. I'm not too sure about evil uses of 3rd party cookies. I do not consider retargeting to be evil. Other stuff like tracking browsing history can be done but it is extremely inefficient, and does not really return much for the amount of time and effort invested into it. What about PII you ask? Start with drop sites, where people willingly submit their personally identifiable information, and then it's up to the DMPs to actually correlate the data, which can then be used as ad targeting information. As far as I can tell, even with the big hoohaa over companies like Rapleaf, the truth of the matter is that it's very very inefficient so far. Privacy is simple IMO. Don't submit your information to websites that ask for anything more than what is needed. Banning third party cookies is like using a cannon to shoot a mosquito.

_delirium 14y ago
As an internet user, retargeting is honestly one of my #1 targets. I find it super-creepy that some websites show me things based on other websites I visit, and I want a way to stop it.
- melvinram 14y ago
  Would you rather see ads for things that are completely irrelevant? Relevance requires data. Edit: I do believe the user should have more control over what companies are allowed to retarget with an easy opt out mechanism implemented by every ad network as well as a way to limit the frequency. I've experience companies going WAY overboard on their retargeting and it feels stalker-ish.
  - _delirium 14y ago
    I'd like things relevant to the site I'm currently visiting, not based on an attempt to construct a personalized profile of me specifically. The former is reasonable contextual advertising (you visit a sci-fi site, you get ads for sci-fi books), while the latter starts feeling like someone compiling an FBI file on my preferences. Apart from the creepiness, it also helps me mentally compartmentalize and context-switch better, when the ads on a site are relevant to the site, rather than to some other site I may have visited in the past which is not what I'm currently trying to concentrate on. Now maybe that's the point: to throw me off my current train of thought by reminding me of some previous train of thought. I was previously planning a trip, but now I'm trying to research something else and trying not to think about that trip I have to plan, so I can get something else done in the next hour. But the advertiser thinks maybe reminding me of that trip would be a good idea, which is maybe even statistically justified, because I do have to plan it in the next week, and a significant amount of money will be spent. But that's so mentally invasive that it's what will probably drive me to finally install AdBlock. It's like having your own personal Troll Clippy following you around whispering "oh interesting research, but remember that trip you have to plan? LOL I knew you would!" To get things done in a modern workplace that has pervasive use of the internet and pervasive distractions, you have to block out things that are relevant to your interests but not to the current task. And retargeting does not help with that.
    - melvinram 14y ago
      I see your point but it's hardly an effective usage of resources. In my experience, retargeting ads produce higher CTRs than generic ads. This means that a publisher is able to derive 2-10x more revenue from the same ad space if they used retargeting ads instead of contextual ads. I agree that some level of self-regulation is in order. Users should have a way to control the level of retargeting they experience and from whom, but to remove the entire mechanism that enables retargeting will only hurt the web because ROI on ad dollars will be lower. Lower ROI = less being spent on online advertising. Less spent on ads = less revenue for publishers. Less revenue for publishers = less investment from publisher to drive more revenue, which will likely mean lower quantity and quality of content created.
  - 14y ago
- chewxy 14y ago
  Why? You visit say... kogan.com.au, they know what fridges you look at. That's intent to buy. You're cookied as #12412214. In the backend, that cookie ID is labeled as FridgeLover. The next website you go to that has an ad slot, when the ad call is made, your anonymized information is submitted, and if the advertiser wins the bid, the advertiser shows you ads of fridges, because the advertiser remembers that cookie ID 12412214 is a FridgeLover. It's anonymous (though significant efforts can be expended for less anonymity). And most importantly, it helps users recall products they've seen. It is relevant to the user (fun bits: buy retargeted ads on competitor sites!)
  - ricardobeat 14y ago
    "It's relevant" is not a good excuse. Using pieces of my email (like google) or my own friends (like facebook) is the result of that line of thought and extremely invasive and creepy.
    - melvinram 14y ago
      "It's relevant" is the ultimate "excuse" to show an ad.
  - deleted 14y ago
    [deleted]
  - brokenrecord 14y ago
    You seem like that lobbyist from Thank you for smoking... Sorry it's just the feeling I got.
- brugidou 14y ago
  why is that creepy? Both websites are related through a retargeter. One sends the data over to the other. It's just like they were the same websites or same corporation. If you don't like this then you can avoid theses websites that sell/buy your information. Although that's a good chunk of the Internet. Just make sure you send private information to trusted sites only.
  - ihsw 14y ago
    Because it's not opt-in and there's no way to opt-out.
    - maxerickson 14y ago
      It's more correct to say that the ways to opt out are esoteric. Something like RequestPolicy allows the user to opt out of everything.
      - eksith 14y ago
        It's more correct to say that the ways to opt out are esoteric. And it's also disingenuous. If the default is opt-in (and that's never OK, regardless of your rationalisations) and opt-out is hidden somewhere on the 8th subpage of a company you've never heard of or will likely never know about without view-source. I can count on one finger the number of times I've seen the source of a targetted ad... the middle one. Self-governance does not work when the power of technology is asymmetric. Whether it's cookies, spam or nuclear weapons, deterrence is the only effective solution.
        maxerickson 14y ago
        You are incorrectly pigeonholing me here.
  - ricardobeat 14y ago
    If you don't like being filmed in public and face-tracked everywhere you go, just don't ever leave home. Can you picture yourself saying that in 10 years?
jacquesm 14y ago
Personally I can't stand retargeting, if there is one turn-off I have when visiting websites it is being hounded from site to site by an ad. That signals to me to never ever buy that product. That it is 'exciting' to those in the advertising industry is a signal all by itself. Once a while ago I googled for a bit around the time I was buying a car. For weeks afterwards I got hounded by car ads for some brand. Needless to say that brand is not on my short list for any future purchases. Any advantage in advertising has turned out to be short lived. It's like building up a resistance to certain chemicals, at some point you need a harder variety to reach your goal. And then the resistance increases and so on. Retargeting will work for a while and then we'll be back to square one, more obnoxious ads and less content. Until all you see is ads.
- chewxy 14y ago
  There is a general rule of thumb that a person has to look at/interact with/be cognitively aware of an ad at least 7 times before any action can be taken. Showing ads across sites is just one more way to do that. In fact I would rather have relevant ads show up than irrelevant ads. I will admit that many companies out there do overdo their retargeting campaign though. That's what the company does that is mistaken, not the technology.
  - ihsw 14y ago
    The psychological requirements to achieve that task and your personal preferences are irrelevant, it is underhanded and obscene. I will not deny that this is a technological solution to a social problem, and yes it is mismatched, but web browsers need to be managed by responsible stewards that protect their users from abuse (it is abuse).
    - jchrisa 14y ago
      It's just the nature of the global namespace. Makes the world look small. Although I can see how this would have some short term appeal to use Firefox. I may give it another spin hope it's fast and stable.
ricardobeat 14y ago
> I do not consider retargeting to be evil. What a coincidence that you work in the field!
- taf2 14y ago
  why do you consider it evil? it seems like a great way to reach back out to someone who was potentially interested in your service. if all retargeting is doing is showing you ads from a website you already visited. How is that evil? Are babies dead because of it? Or perhaps do you remember that you like that website and eventually signup because you got the extra reminder... that is just called advertising and it's what powers/pays for most of the free web... not a big deal really... the minority can and does block these ads big deal..
  - Dylan16807 14y ago
    Did they tell you they were interested? Hand you a business card? No, you're stalking them. That's why it's bad. *impersonal you
    - taf2 14y ago
      If walked into my office to browse or came into my retail store to browse I think you are it might be interested - but really this is the Internet so it's neither a stalker or an brick and mortor store... You can choose to block third party cookies - If we make them off by default you lose that choice
J_Darnley 14y ago
I find my cannon (RequestPolicy and NoScript) to be the right size weapon for the target I am aiming at, which I do not believe is the size of a mosquito.
ihsw 14y ago
What's wrong with having an opt-in system for tracking?
- melvinram 14y ago
  It wouldn't work, that's whats wrong with it.
  - ihsw 14y ago
    That's the idea. Dictatorships would look at the concept of democracy and say 'it doesn't work' but that doesn't make dictatorships any less objectionable.
  - PavlovsCat 14y ago
    That's a problem with tracking, not with opt-in.
Ao7bei3s 14y ago
Evercookies and analyzing TCP stack signatures are ok but banning third party cookies is like "using a cannon to shoot a mosquito"?! > Privacy is simple ... Don't submit ... No it's not: ad companies aren't asking, they are grabbing what they can get. When users say "no" (eg by using adblockers or disabling cookies), these companies ignore that and try to find ways around. Do you find that ethical?
- chewxy 14y ago
  No. In my experience it's not the ad companies that ask for them. It's usually the advertiser (i.e. the people advertising) that ask for them. Market forces (i.e. the demand) means that technologies will be made available to them if they're willing to pay high enough a sum. As for evercookies and TCP stack analysis, I'm pointing out that the technologies to do cookieless tracking is already being used. And I feel it's a bad move. I would rather have cookied tracking where it's easier to control things, than to have cookieless tracking where it is generally grey area'd and difficult to see what advertisers are doing.
  - Amadou 14y ago
    > No. In my experience it's not the ad companies that ask for them. It's usually the advertiser That is a distinction without a difference.
    - taf2 14y ago
      the difference is it's the website you're using and enjoying that is demanding this extra information. it's what they get in return for giving something to you for "free"...
      - jacquesm 14y ago
        You have your parties muddled up. The website you are using is not 'the advertiser', they're the publisher.
moxie 14y ago
I'm interested in the culture implications of your willingness to comment on a story like this and openly admit that you work in this area of the advertising (surveillance?) industry. Certainly, I don't think anyone would feel comfortable commenting on a story about SPAM mitigation techniques (without using a throwaway account) with text like "This sucks, I'm a spammer, and I'm really excited about it. Don't like SPAM? Don't share your email address!" Is there really that much cultural acceptance of your field? I assumed this was the kind of thing you had to awkwardly talk around when someone asks "what do you do?" in a bar where others might overhear your response. One of the things that shocked me most while working at Twitter was that nobody there uses an ad blocker. Like, I literally couldn't find a single person, and I've always assumed that anyone with the technical ability to install ABP immediately did so. So maybe I'm out of touch? Legitimately curious.
- jedberg 14y ago
  I never use an ad blocker either. I know that a lot of the web is only possible because of ads. That being said, I'm pretty adept at using my brain for ad blocking. I didn't even notice when Facebook rolled out sponsored posts.
  - magic_haze 14y ago
    Agreed, but the problem is, it has been overused to the point that they have become nuisances. I really don't want to be a parasite, so I usually go disable abp on sites that I trust (which, ironically, makes all those "thanks for not using adblocker" messages on reddit rather counterproductive.)
- vosper 14y ago
  The company I work for allows targeting of advertisements based on the video content on a page. We do track users by dropping a cookie (so that we can calculate GRPs) but make no attempt to identify or behaviourally target users - we don't believe either are very effective for brand-building, which is our target market; it's about having your brand associated with certain content, not patterns of browsing. A lot of people at work use AdBlock - even the operations people who spend a lot of their time looking at (and for) ad-laden pages will often have one browser with and another without, or will browse in Incognito mode when they need to see ads. I've long found it a bit ironic...
belorn 14y ago
Third party cookies are not banned, they are turned of by default. In the same way you are asking users to make active choices about their information, a change in default is asking ad companies to only track users that want targeted ads. I constantly see people on HN commenting that they like targeted ads. Those should be your customers. I and others who do not want targeted ads should be left alone. We did not ask for your data to be sent to our machines. We did not ask for your code to be run on our machine. We did not ask to be tracked and sold just because we happened to read a website. We are not your target audience, so stop trying to force us in taking up defense against you. We should not be forced to turn of all cookies, have anti-spyware installed, and going through settings to enable no-tracking cookies. The advertising industry really need to grow up and start focusing on customers that want their services. With all their current data about who click on ads, this should not be such a hard move forward.
icebraining 14y ago
The sites I visit are private information. How exactly can I not submit that?
clobber 14y ago
Sorry, this is a good thing and it makes the web better. Advertisers have been abusing users for years and it just keeps getting worse. Local Shared Objects (Flash Cookies) are only one example. Facebook's attempt at the Beacon project was another.
cpeterso 14y ago
Firefox is blocking all third-party cookies, just ones from domains the user has never visited. So third-party widgets like Disqus and Facebook should still work. I suspect this move will penalize smaller ad networks and consolidate power to big players, like Google and Facebook, that are visited by users.
taf2 14y ago
do you have more details about how to use "TCP stack signatures"... is that like using SYN Cookies? Keeping track of the opening packet request and associating it back to a user via a real cookie maybe?

by chewxy 14y ago

_delirium 14y ago

As an internet user, retargeting is honestly one of my #1 targets. I find it super-creepy that some websites show me things based on other websites I visit, and I want a way to stop it.

melvinram 14y ago
Would you rather see ads for things that are completely irrelevant? Relevance requires data. Edit: I do believe the user should have more control over what companies are allowed to retarget with an easy opt out mechanism implemented by every ad network as well as a way to limit the frequency. I've experience companies going WAY overboard on their retargeting and it feels stalker-ish.
- _delirium 14y ago
  I'd like things relevant to the site I'm currently visiting, not based on an attempt to construct a personalized profile of me specifically. The former is reasonable contextual advertising (you visit a sci-fi site, you get ads for sci-fi books), while the latter starts feeling like someone compiling an FBI file on my preferences. Apart from the creepiness, it also helps me mentally compartmentalize and context-switch better, when the ads on a site are relevant to the site, rather than to some other site I may have visited in the past which is not what I'm currently trying to concentrate on. Now maybe that's the point: to throw me off my current train of thought by reminding me of some previous train of thought. I was previously planning a trip, but now I'm trying to research something else and trying not to think about that trip I have to plan, so I can get something else done in the next hour. But the advertiser thinks maybe reminding me of that trip would be a good idea, which is maybe even statistically justified, because I do have to plan it in the next week, and a significant amount of money will be spent. But that's so mentally invasive that it's what will probably drive me to finally install AdBlock. It's like having your own personal Troll Clippy following you around whispering "oh interesting research, but remember that trip you have to plan? LOL I knew you would!" To get things done in a modern workplace that has pervasive use of the internet and pervasive distractions, you have to block out things that are relevant to your interests but not to the current task. And retargeting does not help with that.
  - melvinram 14y ago
    I see your point but it's hardly an effective usage of resources. In my experience, retargeting ads produce higher CTRs than generic ads. This means that a publisher is able to derive 2-10x more revenue from the same ad space if they used retargeting ads instead of contextual ads. I agree that some level of self-regulation is in order. Users should have a way to control the level of retargeting they experience and from whom, but to remove the entire mechanism that enables retargeting will only hurt the web because ROI on ad dollars will be lower. Lower ROI = less being spent on online advertising. Less spent on ads = less revenue for publishers. Less revenue for publishers = less investment from publisher to drive more revenue, which will likely mean lower quantity and quality of content created.
- 14y ago
chewxy 14y ago
Why? You visit say... kogan.com.au, they know what fridges you look at. That's intent to buy. You're cookied as #12412214. In the backend, that cookie ID is labeled as FridgeLover. The next website you go to that has an ad slot, when the ad call is made, your anonymized information is submitted, and if the advertiser wins the bid, the advertiser shows you ads of fridges, because the advertiser remembers that cookie ID 12412214 is a FridgeLover. It's anonymous (though significant efforts can be expended for less anonymity). And most importantly, it helps users recall products they've seen. It is relevant to the user (fun bits: buy retargeted ads on competitor sites!)
- ricardobeat 14y ago
  "It's relevant" is not a good excuse. Using pieces of my email (like google) or my own friends (like facebook) is the result of that line of thought and extremely invasive and creepy.
  - melvinram 14y ago
    "It's relevant" is the ultimate "excuse" to show an ad.
- deleted 14y ago
  [deleted]
- brokenrecord 14y ago
  You seem like that lobbyist from Thank you for smoking... Sorry it's just the feeling I got.
brugidou 14y ago
why is that creepy? Both websites are related through a retargeter. One sends the data over to the other. It's just like they were the same websites or same corporation. If you don't like this then you can avoid theses websites that sell/buy your information. Although that's a good chunk of the Internet. Just make sure you send private information to trusted sites only.
- ihsw 14y ago
  Because it's not opt-in and there's no way to opt-out.
  - maxerickson 14y ago
    It's more correct to say that the ways to opt out are esoteric. Something like RequestPolicy allows the user to opt out of everything.
    - eksith 14y ago
      It's more correct to say that the ways to opt out are esoteric. And it's also disingenuous. If the default is opt-in (and that's never OK, regardless of your rationalisations) and opt-out is hidden somewhere on the 8th subpage of a company you've never heard of or will likely never know about without view-source. I can count on one finger the number of times I've seen the source of a targetted ad... the middle one. Self-governance does not work when the power of technology is asymmetric. Whether it's cookies, spam or nuclear weapons, deterrence is the only effective solution.
      - maxerickson 14y ago
        You are incorrectly pigeonholing me here.
- ricardobeat 14y ago
  If you don't like being filmed in public and face-tracked everywhere you go, just don't ever leave home. Can you picture yourself saying that in 10 years?

jacquesm 14y ago

Personally I can't stand retargeting, if there is one turn-off I have when visiting websites it is being hounded from site to site by an ad. That signals to me to never ever buy that product. That it is 'exciting' to those in the advertising industry is a signal all by itself. Once a while ago I googled for a bit around the time I was buying a car. For weeks afterwards I got hounded by car ads for some brand. Needless to say that brand is not on my short list for any future purchases. Any advantage in advertising has turned out to be short lived. It's like building up a resistance to certain chemicals, at some point you need a harder variety to reach your goal. And then the resistance increases and so on. Retargeting will work for a while and then we'll be back to square one, more obnoxious ads and less content. Until all you see is ads.

chewxy 14y ago
There is a general rule of thumb that a person has to look at/interact with/be cognitively aware of an ad at least 7 times before any action can be taken. Showing ads across sites is just one more way to do that. In fact I would rather have relevant ads show up than irrelevant ads. I will admit that many companies out there do overdo their retargeting campaign though. That's what the company does that is mistaken, not the technology.
- ihsw 14y ago
  The psychological requirements to achieve that task and your personal preferences are irrelevant, it is underhanded and obscene. I will not deny that this is a technological solution to a social problem, and yes it is mismatched, but web browsers need to be managed by responsible stewards that protect their users from abuse (it is abuse).
  - jchrisa 14y ago
    It's just the nature of the global namespace. Makes the world look small. Although I can see how this would have some short term appeal to use Firefox. I may give it another spin hope it's fast and stable.

ricardobeat 14y ago

> I do not consider retargeting to be evil. What a coincidence that you work in the field!

taf2 14y ago
why do you consider it evil? it seems like a great way to reach back out to someone who was potentially interested in your service. if all retargeting is doing is showing you ads from a website you already visited. How is that evil? Are babies dead because of it? Or perhaps do you remember that you like that website and eventually signup because you got the extra reminder... that is just called advertising and it's what powers/pays for most of the free web... not a big deal really... the minority can and does block these ads big deal..
- Dylan16807 14y ago
  Did they tell you they were interested? Hand you a business card? No, you're stalking them. That's why it's bad. *impersonal you
  - taf2 14y ago
    If walked into my office to browse or came into my retail store to browse I think you are it might be interested - but really this is the Internet so it's neither a stalker or an brick and mortor store... You can choose to block third party cookies - If we make them off by default you lose that choice

J_Darnley 14y ago

I find my cannon (RequestPolicy and NoScript) to be the right size weapon for the target I am aiming at, which I do not believe is the size of a mosquito.

ihsw 14y ago

What's wrong with having an opt-in system for tracking?

melvinram 14y ago
It wouldn't work, that's whats wrong with it.
- ihsw 14y ago
  That's the idea. Dictatorships would look at the concept of democracy and say 'it doesn't work' but that doesn't make dictatorships any less objectionable.
- PavlovsCat 14y ago
  That's a problem with tracking, not with opt-in.

Ao7bei3s 14y ago

Evercookies and analyzing TCP stack signatures are ok but banning third party cookies is like "using a cannon to shoot a mosquito"?! > Privacy is simple ... Don't submit ... No it's not: ad companies aren't asking, they are grabbing what they can get. When users say "no" (eg by using adblockers or disabling cookies), these companies ignore that and try to find ways around. Do you find that ethical?

chewxy 14y ago
No. In my experience it's not the ad companies that ask for them. It's usually the advertiser (i.e. the people advertising) that ask for them. Market forces (i.e. the demand) means that technologies will be made available to them if they're willing to pay high enough a sum. As for evercookies and TCP stack analysis, I'm pointing out that the technologies to do cookieless tracking is already being used. And I feel it's a bad move. I would rather have cookied tracking where it's easier to control things, than to have cookieless tracking where it is generally grey area'd and difficult to see what advertisers are doing.
- Amadou 14y ago
  > No. In my experience it's not the ad companies that ask for them. It's usually the advertiser That is a distinction without a difference.
  - taf2 14y ago
    the difference is it's the website you're using and enjoying that is demanding this extra information. it's what they get in return for giving something to you for "free"...
    - jacquesm 14y ago
      You have your parties muddled up. The website you are using is not 'the advertiser', they're the publisher.

moxie 14y ago

I'm interested in the culture implications of your willingness to comment on a story like this and openly admit that you work in this area of the advertising (surveillance?) industry. Certainly, I don't think anyone would feel comfortable commenting on a story about SPAM mitigation techniques (without using a throwaway account) with text like "This sucks, I'm a spammer, and I'm really excited about it. Don't like SPAM? Don't share your email address!" Is there really that much cultural acceptance of your field? I assumed this was the kind of thing you had to awkwardly talk around when someone asks "what do you do?" in a bar where others might overhear your response. One of the things that shocked me most while working at Twitter was that nobody there uses an ad blocker. Like, I literally couldn't find a single person, and I've always assumed that anyone with the technical ability to install ABP immediately did so. So maybe I'm out of touch? Legitimately curious.

jedberg 14y ago
I never use an ad blocker either. I know that a lot of the web is only possible because of ads. That being said, I'm pretty adept at using my brain for ad blocking. I didn't even notice when Facebook rolled out sponsored posts.
- magic_haze 14y ago
  Agreed, but the problem is, it has been overused to the point that they have become nuisances. I really don't want to be a parasite, so I usually go disable abp on sites that I trust (which, ironically, makes all those "thanks for not using adblocker" messages on reddit rather counterproductive.)
vosper 14y ago
The company I work for allows targeting of advertisements based on the video content on a page. We do track users by dropping a cookie (so that we can calculate GRPs) but make no attempt to identify or behaviourally target users - we don't believe either are very effective for brand-building, which is our target market; it's about having your brand associated with certain content, not patterns of browsing. A lot of people at work use AdBlock - even the operations people who spend a lot of their time looking at (and for) ad-laden pages will often have one browser with and another without, or will browse in Incognito mode when they need to see ads. I've long found it a bit ironic...

belorn 14y ago

Third party cookies are not banned, they are turned of by default. In the same way you are asking users to make active choices about their information, a change in default is asking ad companies to only track users that want targeted ads. I constantly see people on HN commenting that they like targeted ads. Those should be your customers. I and others who do not want targeted ads should be left alone. We did not ask for your data to be sent to our machines. We did not ask for your code to be run on our machine. We did not ask to be tracked and sold just because we happened to read a website. We are not your target audience, so stop trying to force us in taking up defense against you. We should not be forced to turn of all cookies, have anti-spyware installed, and going through settings to enable no-tracking cookies. The advertising industry really need to grow up and start focusing on customers that want their services. With all their current data about who click on ads, this should not be such a hard move forward.

icebraining 14y ago

The sites I visit are private information. How exactly can I not submit that?

clobber 14y ago

Sorry, this is a good thing and it makes the web better. Advertisers have been abusing users for years and it just keeps getting worse. Local Shared Objects (Flash Cookies) are only one example. Facebook's attempt at the Beacon project was another.

cpeterso 14y ago

Firefox is blocking all third-party cookies, just ones from domains the user has never visited. So third-party widgets like Disqus and Facebook should still work. I suspect this move will penalize smaller ad networks and consolidate power to big players, like Google and Facebook, that are visited by users.

taf2 14y ago

do you have more details about how to use "TCP stack signatures"... is that like using SYN Cookies? Keeping track of the opening packet request and associating it back to a user via a real cookie maybe?