I remember there was a site that showed all the characteristics that could make you unique. In my case, what gave me away was the unique id of the canvas.
Ask HN: Refusing all cookies, still targeted by ads. How?
81–90 of 118 posts
Re: Ask HN: Refusing all cookies, still targeted by ads. How?
#82Earlier quoted context omitted.
I have also looked there and what makes me unique is that nobody else has the same list of installed fonts, which is not a surprise for me, because I have bought several commercial high-quality typefaces, while most people have only the fonts installed by the operating system and by popular office suites. Besides the fonts, only 3% of the people recorded in their database have their monitors configured for 30-bit col…
Have you tried Firefox's resistFingerprinting abou:config flag? I don't know if they've implemented those but technically speaking I don't think a vm is necessary.
I have tried that right now, in Firefox 102.12.
It hides the fact that I have a 30-bit monitor by pretending that it is a 24-bit monitor, but the list of available fonts remains visible, so I can still be uniquely identified.
Re: Ask HN: Refusing all cookies, still targeted by ads. How?
#83Earlier quoted context omitted.
Have you tried Firefox's resistFingerprinting abou:config flag? I don't know if they've implemented those but technically speaking I don't think a vm is necessary.
I have tried that right now, in Firefox 102.12. It hides the fact that I have a 30-bit monitor by pretending that it is a 24-bit monitor, but the list of available fonts remains visible, so I can still be uniquely identified.
Looks like there's a separate pref for fonts: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31544902
Re: Ask HN: Refusing all cookies, still targeted by ads. How?
#84I allow cookies at least for the session or until the browser closes and I take simple steps to block ads and I never see them on either my PC or Android phone.
I used to use stricter methods such as blocking cookies outright or having them automatically delete upon receipt and changing the browser's user agent but it's not necessary to go to those lengths.
If one wants to see ads then fine, if you don't then you don't have to, even YouTube ads can easily be avoided. As this ad problem arises so frequently and as the solutions are so simple one has to ask why is it so difficult to get the point across that getting rid of ads is simple.
Re: Ask HN: Refusing all cookies, still targeted by ads. How?
#85Fingerprinting. Everything about you that isn't identical to everyone else can be combined to guess who you likely are. Your exact browser version, OS, supported APIs, your IP address, your latency to Google servers... Anything that isn't a complete match to everyone else. You may have a new install, but your IP and latency match your old install. What are the odds you're not the same person? It's all probabilistic.…
some additional methods to detect you
- the websites you view. you may have a common 3-4 that you visit in a row, sometimes on autopilot. fingerprint.
- the way you type and move your mouse. your cadence is unique, you have subtle changes in how you use your mouse. fingerprint.
Re: Ask HN: Refusing all cookies, still targeted by ads. How?
#86An easy fix is to use something like mullvad-browser:
https://mullvad.net/en/browser/mullvad-browser
Though it's annoying having bars around browser to prevent display resolution fingerprinting.
You'll also not be able to login to some sites like tiktok (and probably others) which I don't know the fix for without just disabling all tracking protection.
Re: Ask HN: Refusing all cookies, still targeted by ads. How?
#87> maybe the simple answer is that refusing cookies doesn't actually do anything? I agree with all the other comments that are saying this is probably fingerprinting, but you can check whether refusing cookies is doing anything. Two ways: 1. On a page where you refused all cookies but are seeing targeted ads, open developer tools and go into the "Application" tab. Open up Storage > Cookies. Do you see anything listed?…
Yes, I tried that with mostly inconclusive results, maybe I chose the wrong site, except for one or two sites that were either really impressively good or bad
Re: Ask HN: Refusing all cookies, still targeted by ads. How?
#88If you are at all concerned with privacy, why are you using Chrome? It should be no surprise that the browser built by one of the largest data-harvesting companies in the world is pretty good at harvesting your data... If this is a concern for you, maybe consider Firefox? Then grab some extra privacy-conserving extensions like ublock, adnauseam, privacy badger, privacy possum, ghostery, decentraleyes, clearURLs, ISti…
Actually extensions are blocked for "security and privacy concerns", and our internal systems don't work well with non Chromium browsers
Re: Ask HN: Refusing all cookies, still targeted by ads. How?
#89> I could think of sophisticated methods, but maybe the simple answer is that refusing cookies doesn't actually do anything? This is a great opportunity to conduct a double blind experiment! Set up three Chrome profiles: your current one, one that's totally fresh, and one that's connecting from a different IP over a Socks proxy. Write a script to randomly start Chrome with one of these profiles; every hour quit the b…
Profile? not allowed here by IT
Re: Ask HN: Refusing all cookies, still targeted by ads. How?
#90Do you mean you click reject in the analytics pop-up dialogs (or hide them with ad blocker), or that you disable cookies in the browser?
Click, I can have a safer setup but don't bother