Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Google’s approach to replacing the cookie is drawing antitrust scrutiny

digiday.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

111–120 of 354 posts

Re: Google’s approach to replacing the cookie is drawing antitrust scrutiny

#111

Post by SulfurHexaFluri »

nemothekid wrote: post #99
kevingadd wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How did Mozilla survive as a business? Why is Brave around?

> How did Mozilla survive as a business? On one end by almost literally being an extension of Google. On the other end by constantly laying off engineers. A big problem people are just handwaving away is that browsers are incredibly complex nowadays and how do you fund development of a browser engine? If you think the "Linux" model would work, well browsers already have that - it's called Mozilla and there is never a…

Browsers are way more complex than OSs these days. Mozillas Servo project had over 40,000 commits and still wasn't ready for production and it was only a small part of the browser. I don't think there is anything else that could have 40k commits and still be a tech demo.

Re: Google’s approach to replacing the cookie is drawing antitrust scrutiny

#112

Post by dwaite »

JMTQp8lwXL wrote: post #101
ogre_codes wrote: post #57

Google's way of leveraging their browser dominance to use 3rd party cookies as a way to gain competitive advantage: Step 1: Implement a whole new browser functionality where Google alone can track people. Step 2: Eliminate 3rd party cookies so Google's competitors have to create increasingly unethical and invasive fingerprinting techniques to remain competitive. Step 3: Increase advertising rates since they are the o…

Doesn't the rollout of IPv6 largely replace the cookie as a useful identifier of sorts?

IPv6 may make fingerprinting harder since you might lose a single static identifier for users. Of course, you could gain a unique identifier per device on a subnet without security measures there.

However, it doesn't affect cookies which are bound to origin names rather than addresses.

Re: Google’s approach to replacing the cookie is drawing antitrust scrutiny

#113

Post by SulfurHexaFluri »

victorhooi wrote: post #48
Simulacra wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In a word, no. Google and other corporate monoliths like it depend on data, as much as they can get, as personal as it can be, and pervasive as the air we breathe. Consumers want privacy, control over their data, and the power to say no. The only sensible middle ground is for Google and others to be up front about the data, what they do with it, where it goes, etc. and the consumer having the ability to say no. Unfor…

I think you're projecting the HN crowd a bit here. The majority of normal people probably don't care as much about "privacy" as some of the vocal folks here do. I'm not making a value judgement on that, it's simply how it is. People want to use services like Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram or Google search/Gmail/Google Maps that have the functionality they enjoy. If those companies can show them targeted ads vs random…

The majority of users do care about privacy but its a concept they struggle to understand and they do not know when they are being tracked, what is being tracked or how to stop it.

The EU was on the right track about requiring tracking to be opt in while also having an option to say no without being blocked from the service.

Re: Google’s approach to replacing the cookie is drawing antitrust scrutiny

#114

Post by pferde »

justinclift wrote: post #110
JMTQp8lwXL wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Doesn't the rollout of IPv6 largely replace the cookie as a useful identifier of sorts?

That's a good point. Static IPv6 addresses or even a (small) pool of them could make for a reliable ID. Wonder how people should work around that?

https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc7217 is one way.

Re: Google’s approach to replacing the cookie is drawing antitrust scrutiny

#115

Post by gcblkjaidfj »

esperent wrote: post #98
Triv888 wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And Google is probably paying Mozilla so that they block those cookies too... I think that they might have paid them for other things too... like for blocking 99% of extensions on Firefox mobile (those are speculations, that are very probable).

I still use Firefox 68 on Android since that's the last version to support extensions. It works well, for now.

I can't imagine the kind of Stupids that are steering mozilla, but they definitely want people to move to chrome.

They disabled many loved extensions by power users for absolutely no reason at all! after those power users spend years bending to all their capricious changes. moving to webextension? done. moving to a new mobile UI? done. But, they still want you to move to chrome no matter what.

We should take firefox out of their hands before it is too late.

Re: Google’s approach to replacing the cookie is drawing antitrust scrutiny

#116

Post by minikites »

hashkb wrote: post #70
dceddia wrote: post #68

Wait wait. So Google kills off third party cookies, but then creates some new “more private” workaround, perhaps relying on some kind of trusted servers (called “FLEDGE” in the article). And then, who gets to run those servers? Even if it’s not Google, it’s probably not just anyone , right? Does that lead to a situation where there’s some authority or group of authorities that decides whether you or your startup gets…

The "open web" only barely ever existed; MSIE killed it and Chrome is just a better weapon in the hands of a next generation monopoly.

And now with Facebook and Twitter, the idea of the "open web" is irrelevant to most people since they get everything they want or need from those two places.

Re: Google’s approach to replacing the cookie is drawing antitrust scrutiny

#117

Post by [deleted] »

derekp7 wrote: post #2

So if I understand this correctly, then killing off 3rd party cookies is anti-competitive, leaving them in is anti-privacy, and putting out a privacy-enhancing alternative is also anti-competitive. Is there anything that can be done that would satisfy all regulations? Also, this reminds me of a story I heard years ago, that a California oil change location needed to store oil above ground due to EPA regulations, but…

[deleted]

Re: Google’s approach to replacing the cookie is drawing antitrust scrutiny

#118

Post by gcblkjaidfj »

SubiculumCode wrote: post #104
esperent wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I still use Firefox 68 on Android since that's the last version to support extensions. It works well, for now.

I have extensions on Firefox nightly for android.

You have 20 extensions that were "approved" by mozilla more than a year ago! All the others are banned forever.

You can install uBlock, but not uMatrix. Many many extensions are banned just because they reviewed ONE extension that they preferred for a certain usecase. For example, for OLED phone night reading, there's the most installed at the time extension "Dark Background and Light text" that offered many customizations and worked on reader mode, and more importantly redish text/links. But too bad, because Mozilla picked the one with NO settings, but a nicer icon (which is literally disney's darth vader, but who cares) called "dark reader" which only have bright blue links and white text (and despite the name do not work on reader mode), and because there is already one extension with "dark mode" they will never whitelist the others, or even provide a setting to enable it on your own.

Re: Google’s approach to replacing the cookie is drawing antitrust scrutiny

#119

Post by Triv888 »

esperent wrote: post #98
Triv888 wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And Google is probably paying Mozilla so that they block those cookies too... I think that they might have paid them for other things too... like for blocking 99% of extensions on Firefox mobile (those are speculations, that are very probable).

I still use Firefox 68 on Android since that's the last version to support extensions. It works well, for now.

I do too, but we don't get security updates. It is ridiculous that they went backward like this.

If someone has a better explanation then Google paying them for doing that, please let me know. I think Mozilla's new CEO is a sock puppet like most of the sheep out there (including me sometimes).

Re: Google’s approach to replacing the cookie is drawing antitrust scrutiny

#120

Post by gcblkjaidfj »

albertgoeswoof wrote: post #14
ocdtrekkie wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps it's time to recognize that the company simply need not exist in it's present form. If Google was required to spin off Chrome as an independent company, there would be no antitrust issue, and privacy protections Chrome made would not also include anti-privacy features designed to feed Google's ad business. The reality is, Google needs to be broken up. Every fine they get makes that clear.

How would chrome survive as a business?

> How would chrome survive as a business?

by doing *exactly* what Google sued microsoft for trying to do with IE in the 90s. Isn't it funny?

Post reply on HN