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Google Chrome just rolled out a new way to track you and serve ads

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Re: Google Chrome just rolled out a new way to track you and serve ads

#71
post #36

Can anyone explain to me why this is worse than third-party cookies? *If* this lets chrome remove third-party cookies, doesn't it effectively increase your privacy by putting that tracking data on the user's machine instead of having random third-parties involved in every page load to harvest that tracking info? I understand that you can currently turn off third-party cookies, but a bunch of the internet breaks if yo…

> I'd rather have my machine present this kind of data than have a network of unknown third-parties collaborate by sharing bits about me to build a profile.

That’s a bit like saying you’d rather have cameras inside your house streaming your every move than have paparazzi at your door.

In the current model, the third parties have to fight and spend resources to get an imperfect profile of you, while you can make their life harder every step of the way. But your browser has access to information those third-parties could never have; it can make a profile from real data without you having the chance to block it.

Both are bad for privacy, but the new method is way worse and has the potential to become even more invasive. What if Chrome decides to share your bookmarks? Or settings from your extensions? Or specific pages you visit, including private GitHub repositories for your company? Or full URLs with sensitive keys in them?

Re: Google Chrome just rolled out a new way to track you and serve ads

#72
post #45
post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Consistently working as the better browser. Both Chrome and Edge are just hostile towards my browsing experience. Chrome keeps on rolling out new settings to pilfer my browsing data. Edge will just kill all of my settings to anything Microsoft wants. Arc and Firefox are working reliably at the moment but Firefox remains a stable option to come back to everytime.

> Firefox remains a stable option to come back to everytime Don't get me wrong, I've been using Firefox for the last decade and I don't intend on using anything else for the foreseeable future, but Mozilla has no idea what they're doing with Firefox nowadays. Firefox View is the most useless thing I've ever seen, that expiring "independent voices" theme picker was some weird hippie stunt[1], the latest UI redesign wh…

I don't get this Firefox hate. I use Firefox and I'm pretty happy with it and the product's direction. I'm also fine igoring products and features that I'm not interested in.

Re: Google Chrome just rolled out a new way to track you and serve ads

#73
post #29

Just stop being a helpless victim and get rid of this evil corporate spyware and switch to a privacy-respecting browser like Firefox, or even better LibreWolf https://librewolf.net/

I know the goal of LibreWolf is privacy, but logging out of everything on every session was enough for me to deal with the 'privacy' problem.

Maybe because I have adblock, but I just don't get these ads other people talk about.

Re: Google Chrome just rolled out a new way to track you and serve ads

#74

> Tracking technology can arguably benefit us as well. For example, it could be helpful if an online store reminds you every three months you need a new toothbrush, or that this time last year you bought a birthday card for your mum. fuck off

"Advertisements and it's consequences have been a disaster to human race."

a nod to a fragment of well known manifesto. The sooner we ban all forms of such tracking the better we will be as society.

Re: Google Chrome just rolled out a new way to track you and serve ads

#75
post #36

Can anyone explain to me why this is worse than third-party cookies? *If* this lets chrome remove third-party cookies, doesn't it effectively increase your privacy by putting that tracking data on the user's machine instead of having random third-parties involved in every page load to harvest that tracking info? I understand that you can currently turn off third-party cookies, but a bunch of the internet breaks if yo…

There are a few (not that many) things that break on the internet if you turn off third-party cookies, but "I'm no longer being tracked without consent" is not one of them. It's one of the big reasons to get rid of third-party cookies, not an unfortunate side-effect.

Re: Google Chrome just rolled out a new way to track you and serve ads

#76

This appears to be the same as this: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37427227 Top comment on that one was: Key actionable info: to fix this, go to this URL: chrome://settings/adPrivacy and turn off the toggles on each of the three subpages. Alternatively, go to this URL https://www.mozilla.org/firefox/ to fix this permanently.

If enough people switch these settings off, Google will just re-enable them "accidentally" during the next auto-update. Or hide them altogether. This is their business model. They didn't create Chrome out of the goodness of their hearts: it was created to impose their rules on the internet. And since their business model relies on tracking people, that is what they will do. Refusing by deleting Chrome is the only way to oppose this.

Incidentally, I think people working on these features should be ashamed.

Re: Google Chrome just rolled out a new way to track you and serve ads

#77
Also, when it asks you if you want to turn it on and you say “hell, no”, it will turn on a couple of other settings while it is turning that one off.

Make sure you go to chrome://settings/adPrivacy and review and re-disable those.

Or switch browser, which I have done on my personal machines.

Re: Google Chrome just rolled out a new way to track you and serve ads

#78
post #39

> Tracking technology can arguably benefit us as well. For example, it could be helpful if an online store reminds you every three months you need a new toothbrush, or that this time last year you bought a birthday card for your mum. fuck off

It's against the guidelines to be dismissive, but there really is no other response. Especially when you left read the follow-up sentence: > Offloading cognitive effort, such as reminders like these, is a great way automation can assist humanity. Does that pass for journalism? I really don't want to read the rest of the article.

  "Academic rigour, journalistic flair"

Re: Google Chrome just rolled out a new way to track you and serve ads

#80
post #76

This appears to be the same as this: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37427227 Top comment on that one was: Key actionable info: to fix this, go to this URL: chrome://settings/adPrivacy and turn off the toggles on each of the three subpages. Alternatively, go to this URL https://www.mozilla.org/firefox/ to fix this permanently.

If enough people switch these settings off, Google will just re-enable them "accidentally" during the next auto-update. Or hide them altogether. This is their business model. They didn't create Chrome out of the goodness of their hearts: it was created to impose their rules on the internet. And since their business model relies on tracking people, that is what they will do. Refusing by deleting Chrome is the only way…

It already “accidentally” enables two of them when you are prompted to enable the new one and you say no…
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