Interesting trick. But I think adBlockers block requests to entire tracking domains. So even css calls would be blocked?
Not if you're hosting your own tracking information, on your own domain
Crooked Style Sheeding – Webpage tracking using only CSS
31–40 of 180 posts
Re: Crooked Style Sheeding – Webpage tracking using only CSS
#32Earlier quoted context omitted.
> not an easy fix All of this is an easy fix: disable css. In the same way that "I don't want to be tracked by javascript" can easily be resolved by disabling javascript. I'm not seriously suggesting everyone does that, but anyone who is so paranoid that they don't want a site knowing that they're reading its content might want to consider it.
While we, as devs, may get tired of the constant beat-down between site flexibility and privacy, many of our users are unaware. They will go blindly towards flexibility and we have a duty to find as much compromise as possible between those two values lest we just say "it's an easy fix, just turn off your computer". There has to be a middle ground between extremely paranoid turn everything off and extremely liberal w…
I guess my point is "how much anonymity is it reasonable to expect?" Should I have a problem with the fact that nigh-on every URL in the world will leave behind a little footprint when I request it? I don't see an enormous problem with a website anonymously recording the fact that I've clicked a link.
("anonymously" assuming I'm blocking their cookies, which I would if I were that paranoid)
Re: Crooked Style Sheeding – Webpage tracking using only CSS
#33Whose going to be first to make the 'I always browse the Web with CSS disabled' post?
Well, I have firefox `layout.css.visited_links_enabled` set to false not to leak history.
Re: Crooked Style Sheeding – Webpage tracking using only CSS
#34If you're concerned as a user of a malicious site: * Link click tracking - So what, the site could route you through a server side proxy anyways * Hover tracking - Can track movements of course, but doesn't really help fingerprinting. This is still annoying though and not an easy fix * Media query - So what, user agent gives this away mostly anyways * Font checking - Can help fingerprinting...browsers need to start r…
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Re: Crooked Style Sheeding – Webpage tracking using only CSS
#35This is where the talent, funds, and resources will go as ads and marketing are industries with lots of funding available. Even more tracking and of even more pervasive kind. We hate tracking while we bet our time and money on it. The web is cancelled, go back home everyone.
Re: Crooked Style Sheeding – Webpage tracking using only CSS
#36Whose going to be first to make the 'I always browse the Web with CSS disabled' post?
Using lynx, the only thing that makes reading Hacker News somewhat inconvenient is the lack of indentation to show the nesting hierarchy, but otherwise it works quite well. Some other sites are so messed up that it's actually more comfortable to read them in a text-only browser that completely ignores CSS and replaces images by their alt-tags. Of course I frequently do want to look at images, so my main browser remai…
True! I fixed that issue in the community maintained HN version here, https://github.com/arclanguage/anarki/commit/0d6cea75d902899...
Would be nice if HN would fix it, too.
I always browse HN using the links2 browser. No CSS! (Although elinks is pretty interesting, in that it's a text-only browser that implements some CSS.)
Re: Crooked Style Sheeding – Webpage tracking using only CSS
#37If you're concerned as a user of a malicious site: * Link click tracking - So what, the site could route you through a server side proxy anyways * Hover tracking - Can track movements of course, but doesn't really help fingerprinting. This is still annoying though and not an easy fix * Media query - So what, user agent gives this away mostly anyways * Font checking - Can help fingerprinting...browsers need to start r…
> not an easy fix All of this is an easy fix: disable css. In the same way that "I don't want to be tracked by javascript" can easily be resolved by disabling javascript. I'm not seriously suggesting everyone does that, but anyone who is so paranoid that they don't want a site knowing that they're reading its content might want to consider it.
Happily used to (5 years ago) surf the web with no JS and no CSS, or rather applying my own style-sheet for 90% of my web viewing. I'd fall back to Chrome when absolutely necessary. It was fast and comfortable, it just relies on well structured accessible content.
Re: Crooked Style Sheeding – Webpage tracking using only CSS
#38Whose going to be first to make the 'I always browse the Web with CSS disabled' post?
Using lynx, the only thing that makes reading Hacker News somewhat inconvenient is the lack of indentation to show the nesting hierarchy, but otherwise it works quite well. Some other sites are so messed up that it's actually more comfortable to read them in a text-only browser that completely ignores CSS and replaces images by their alt-tags. Of course I frequently do want to look at images, so my main browser remai…
Firefox's "reader view" is quite good for that (and to avoid bloggers terrible choice of fonts/font color/font size)
Re: Crooked Style Sheeding – Webpage tracking using only CSS
#39How does 'check spelling as you type' work, via a dictionary that is previously downloaded, or is this an online service that leaks all/or some of your key presses?
Re: Crooked Style Sheeding – Webpage tracking using only CSS
#40The obvious solution is to block the server-side pages that the CSS elements link to. This kind of tracking can be mitigated the same way any other kind of tracking is already handled by uBlock or uMatrix.
Wouldn't that require a separate blacklist for each site?