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Show HN: I made a privacy-first minimalist Google Analytics

simpleanalytics.io

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Re: Show HN: I made a privacy-first minimalist Google Analytics

#101

Post by harianus »

pdkl95 wrote: post #88
AdriaanvRossum wrote: post #2

Creator here. As a developer, I install analytics for clients, but I never feel comfortable installing Google Analytics because Google creates profiles for their visitors, and uses their information for apps (like AdWords). As we all know, big corporations unnecessarily track users without their consent. I want to change that. So I built Simple Analytics. To ensure that it's fast, secure, and stable, I built it entir…

> unnecessarily track users without their consent Regardless of your intentions, you are collecting enough data to track users. > I am transparent about what I collect ([URL]) That page doesn't mention that you are also collecting (and make no claim about storing) the globally-visible IP address (and any other data in the IP and TCP headers). This can be uniquely identifying; even when it isn't unique you usually onl…

Good comment! I only store the window.innerWidth metric. I updated the what we collect page (https://simpleanalytics.io/what-we-collect) to reflect the IP handling. We don't store them. And fingerprinting is something that would be definitely tracking, not on my watch!

Re: Show HN: I made a privacy-first minimalist Google Analytics

#102

Post by Reedx »

sondr3 wrote: post #17

I've moved away from using any kind of script embedded in my webpages for tracking and instead just use Goaccess ( https://goaccess.io/ ) to analyze my logs. Though there are obvious caveats with this, you need to install it, configure the server logging to match it and so on. But personally the benefits outweighs the cons, it all runs on the server, you are the sole owner off all the data and this tracking doesn't r…

Wow, it's been a long time since I've seen one of these. It's like the olden days with Urchin (what eventually become Google Analytics). They analyzed log files prior to the Google acquisition. IIRC you could buy whatever the current version was (e.g., Urchin 2) for a flat fee and use it forever. There were free alternatives, but I liked Urchin's UI and features the best at the time.

Anyone remember what the price was? I want to say it was something like $60-$100, but my memory could be conflating it with something else.

Re: Show HN: I made a privacy-first minimalist Google Analytics

#103

Post by nickpsecurity »

harianus wrote: post #19
lucideer wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This look great—have bookmarked it for future projects. I would however a little more skeptical with tools claiming to be privacy-first than I would be with GA (who I presume are not privacy-first). On that note, some quick questions: - Any plans to open source? I've used Piwik/Matomo in the past, and while I'm not a massive fan of the code-quality of that project, it's at least auditable (and editable). - You say yo…

- No plans to go open source with the backend, but I do show the code that is run in the browser. The visualisation of the data is not super important I think. - I don't save IP's, not even in the logs. - I don't have unique pageviews at the moment. I will in the future. If the referrer is the same as the current page, I will measure that as a non-unique. What do you think?

Have you considered using a shared-source license where they can inspect and build from source that they have to pay for? And where people can obtain the source freely for academic research and/or security reviews?

Shared-source proprietary goes as far back as Burroughs B5000 mainframe whose customers got the source and could send in fixes/updates. Microsoft has a Shared Source program. Quite a few suppliers in embedded do it. There's also a company that sells UI software which gives the source to customers buying higher-priced version.

I will warn that people might still rip off and use your code. Given it's JavaScript, I think they can do that anyway with reverse engineering. It also sounds like they could build it themselves anyway. Like most software bootstrappers or startups, you're already in a race with other players that might copy you with clean slate implementations. So, I don't know if the risk is that big a deal or not. I figured I should mention it for fairness.

Re: Show HN: I made a privacy-first minimalist Google Analytics

#104

Post by LyndsySimon »

pdkl95 wrote: post #88
AdriaanvRossum wrote: post #2

Creator here. As a developer, I install analytics for clients, but I never feel comfortable installing Google Analytics because Google creates profiles for their visitors, and uses their information for apps (like AdWords). As we all know, big corporations unnecessarily track users without their consent. I want to change that. So I built Simple Analytics. To ensure that it's fast, secure, and stable, I built it entir…

> unnecessarily track users without their consent Regardless of your intentions, you are collecting enough data to track users. > I am transparent about what I collect ([URL]) That page doesn't mention that you are also collecting (and make no claim about storing) the globally-visible IP address (and any other data in the IP and TCP headers). This can be uniquely identifying; even when it isn't unique you usually onl…

I think there's value in at least distributing the data that's collected. I may not like that the analytics provider has my data, but it seems like a lesser evil if that provider isn't also the world's largest ad company and they aren't using it to build profiles behind the scenes to track my every move across a significant part of the Internet.

Given the choice between a lot of data about me given to a small provider and somewhat less data about me given to Google, I'd generally choose the former.

Re: Show HN: I made a privacy-first minimalist Google Analytics

#105

Post by cbnotfromthere »

pierrefar wrote: post #62

Looks good! I'm the founder of a similar service (Blockmetry). Obviously non-tracking web analytics is the future! I'm curious why you chose to host the data yourself instead of giving customers the data immediately at the point of collection. That's the path we chose for Blockmetry as it genuinely required to be a non-tracking web analytics service and makes it impossible to profile users. Any service that hosts its…

Similar service????

Simple Analytics is a real service. Blockmetry is a 90's-looking page with a "contact sales" button and not even a demo (nevermind a real product).

Re: Show HN: I made a privacy-first minimalist Google Analytics

#106

Post by andypants »

harianus wrote: post #19
lucideer wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This look great—have bookmarked it for future projects. I would however a little more skeptical with tools claiming to be privacy-first than I would be with GA (who I presume are not privacy-first). On that note, some quick questions: - Any plans to open source? I've used Piwik/Matomo in the past, and while I'm not a massive fan of the code-quality of that project, it's at least auditable (and editable). - You say yo…

- No plans to go open source with the backend, but I do show the code that is run in the browser. The visualisation of the data is not super important I think. - I don't save IP's, not even in the logs. - I don't have unique pageviews at the moment. I will in the future. If the referrer is the same as the current page, I will measure that as a non-unique. What do you think?

Could a bloom filter be useful here?

Re: Show HN: I made a privacy-first minimalist Google Analytics

#108

Post by gerritsg »

mosselman wrote: post #40

For a project of mine I created an 'actions' table in my database. For every visit (only server-side data) I make an entry into that table. That way I keep track of key metrics that I am interested in (basically which page is loaded and where did the visit come from?). I also store the request id so that I can differentiate between different visits. Entries into this table are made in an new thread in order to preven…

I like this kind of approach way more. It's simple, you don't need to rely on anyone else, and you have complete control over what data you ingest and how you assess it.

Re: Show HN: I made a privacy-first minimalist Google Analytics

#109

Post by LyndsySimon »

sleepyhead wrote: post #66
xrisk wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The IP address isn't stored though.

I don't think that is relevant. What matters is that it is transferred to a third-party. And regardless if it is stored in a database, the servers are still processing the data (and maybe storing the log of it).

How would you do analytics without the IP address being "transferred to a third party"? Outside of self-hosting, either the user's browser is going to be making a request to the analytics provider (and therefore exposes their IP), or you're going to have to have some sort of proxy mechanism on the site's server that strips that information and sends it from there.

Am I missing something?

Re: Show HN: I made a privacy-first minimalist Google Analytics

#110

Post by lucb1e »

xwvvvvwx wrote: post #107

In case some people are unaware, after GDPR google released an addon that allows you to opt-out from google analytics tracking across the web: https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout/

There is no such thing as opt out in GDPR. If it's opt out, it isn't compliant in the first place.
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