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Google tracks individual users per Chrome installation ID

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Re: Google tracks individual users per Chrome installation ID

#421

Post by Yeroc »

some_random wrote: post #19
janpot wrote: post #4

Not endorsing this, but according to https://www.google.com/chrome/privacy/whitepaper.html#variat... > We want to build features that users want, so a subset of users may get a sneak peek at new functionality being tested before it’s launched to the world at large. A list of field trials that are currently active on your installation of Chrome will be included in all requests sent to Google. This Chrome-Variations he…

How many people will actually run chrome with a cli flag? It would be pretty impressive if every single person reading this thread did, but it probably won't even be that. Most people don't even touch their settings. 13 bits of entropy is far from a uuid (but to get it to that you need to disable some more settings, which again very few people do), but it's still plenty good enough to disambiguate individuals over ti…

And Google is certainly in a position to disambiguate that uuid to an individual as soon as they login to gmail or any other Google property!

Re: Google tracks individual users per Chrome installation ID

#422

Post by tartoran »

throwaway41968 wrote: post #249
thu2111 wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, I'm an ex employee. Actually nothing has changed inside the company. "Tracking" as you put it isn't perceived as evil, it never has been, and for good reasons. The only thing that's changed is people's perception of the company and - very recent post 2016 political issues aside - that was mostly driven by a sustained campaign by an angry media industry that wanted money (see: link taxes). Firstly, if tracking u…

Your points are sound, but I'm puzzled by your last line: >It's really only Google and Facebook that get the vitriol. The way I read it, it seems as though it's unfair that they get away with doing questionable stuff when "others do worse". Why yes, if you have nefarious intentions but no power to act them out, people are going to throw less "vitriol" at you than if you do act them out.

Thats right. Is google the most evil? Well, no, I really don't think so. But they exert a lot of evil to the world because of their size, power and ubiquity more than others. Same with Facebook and Amazon.

I always keep in mind the motto Google carried when they stepped in: "Do no evil". I used to love Google back then, but they were something else.

They killed good products that people loved, they abused their trust, they are what they are not because they keep on innovating but because of their current size. They killed a lot of small fries who in aggregate could have given us a lot more value.

Re: Google tracks individual users per Chrome installation ID

#423

Post by sunnyque »

GrayShade wrote: post #418
throwawaylolx wrote: post #381

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just tried it now on google.com, and it sent it in 6 requests. You can ctrl+f in developer tools in Chrome.

Can you also test under the incognito mode?

i've checked this already, chrome doesn't send this header in incognito mode, and this is really good

Re: Google tracks individual users per Chrome installation ID

#424

Post by currysausage »

AlphaWeaver wrote: post #261

According to this source code [0], it looks like this is in Chromium as well. Does that mean this affects Electron applications? [0]: https://chromium.googlesource.com/chromium/src/+/master/comp...

Edge ("Edgium") doesn't appear to send this header. Neither does Chrome in Private or Guest Mode.

Re: Google tracks individual users per Chrome installation ID

#425

Post by wayneftw »

dang wrote: post #360
Shaaaaaaare wrote: post #323

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow, you seem very upset. I suggest going for a walk. Take a couple deep breaths. Calm down. It's just a browser. By the way, what sites do you work on? I'd like to make sure to avoid them.

Please don't respond to a bad comment with another one. That just makes the thread worse. Doubly so for personal attacks, which are a bannable offence on HN.

What was so bad about my comment? Saying that I don’t support Mozilla/Firefox or just not being anti-Google enough?

Also, the guy that you’re responding to simply said that I seemed angry. How is that a personal attack? Somebody else responded that I’m ruining the Internet and somehow that’s not flagged?

Re: Google tracks individual users per Chrome installation ID

#428

Post by jmccorm »

gruez wrote: post #223
c16 wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, But they tested Yahoo of all websites to make sure they don't send tracking data, and not an unrelated website like wikipedia or archive.org. The only non-google test case too I might add.

It's a test case I wouldn't read too much into it. Maybe it's evidence of a massive anti-trust conspiracy at google, but it could very well be because it's the first domain that came to the programmer's mind at the time.

I wasn't aware of this, but it still seems like a thread worth pulling on. You're assuming, right? The reason I ask is that using any third-party company seems inappropriate. Even more so when Google has plenty of domains of its own to test against. Even more so when it is against a media/advertising company. And again, even more so against a company that changed from Google to Bing to power their search function. It seems to be an inappropriate or poor choice, doesn't it?

There's no smoking gun here, but I don't think that concern might be dismissed out of hand. It might be good to see what Yahoo's take on this. This could even evolve into participation by the US Attorney General. I'd like to know more, either way. Like if Yahoo was independently added to the list at a later date, or if it was there from the start?

Re: Google tracks individual users per Chrome installation ID

#429

Post by KenanSulayman »

Don’t forget that even if the number is varying only in an interval of 0 and 7999, this means without cookies a unique chrome installation can be identified if multiple users are using the same IP, like residential houses with families, etc. — that way it is possible to determine the unique amount of devices inside a house.

Re: Google tracks individual users per Chrome installation ID

#430

Post by robocat »

tbodt wrote: post #209
ec109685 wrote: post #29

You can see all the domains they add the header to here: https://chromium.googlesource.com/chromium/src/+/master/comp... Previous discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21034849

Actual list: https://cs.chromium.org/chromium/src/components/google/core/...

Security flaw? Surely some entity is squatting youtube on some TLD?!

If there is a country TLD of X where Google owns google.X but entity Y owns youtube.X then entity Y gets the X-CLIENT-DATA header information. See usage of IsValidHostName() in code.

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