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Google starts tracking all your devices in 8 weeks

forbes.com

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Re: Google starts tracking all your devices in 8 weeks

#121

Post by wkat4242 »

jjav wrote: post #80
rpastuszak wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is getting trickier: - nowadays (iirc) you can serve/proxy those scripts via your own domain (to circumvent ad blocker blocklists) - there are limitations re the number of blocking rules in Manifest V3 It’s cat and mouse at this stage, we’re getting to the point where blocking ads will be as hard/annoying as, say, installing 3rd party apps on your iPhone. Too much of a hassle even for fairly techie users

> limitations re the number of blocking rules in Manifest V3 Which of course was the whole purpose for google pushing for this v3, to benefits ads and hurt users.

Manifest V3 can even work with unlimited blocking rules and in-page content blocking. Firefox' implementation of it does that. So yeah the fact that Google doesn't makes it very deliberate.

Re: Google starts tracking all your devices in 8 weeks

#123

Post by Andrex »

Havoc wrote: post #101

Combined with other news story [0] it sure feels like google is switching from trying to comply with regulation & instead doing what they want with a "Well what are you going to do about it?" attitude. Regulators really need to cut them down to size. Was bad enough during anti-trust era in the US...now we're dealing with multinational entities the size of countries. Can't let that get out of hand or we'll end up livi…

> it sure feels like google is switching from trying to comply with regulation & instead doing what they want with a "Well what are you going to do about it?" attitude.

I got one link for ya buddy.

https://x.com/sundarpichai/status/1854207788290850888

Re: Google starts tracking all your devices in 8 weeks

#125

Post by int_19h »

rpastuszak wrote: post #61
int_19h wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder if at this point an AI-based ad blocker that would actually look at the DOM, or maybe even the image, would be viable. Obviously, this requires significantly more resources. But it feels like a more productive use of the hardware power that we already have, compared to the most recent Electron monstrosity.

Hehe, so I made a (semi) serious project in a similar vein some time ago actually: Https://butter.sonnet.io (Because you deserve butter.)

Very nice.

(And yes, this is all kinda silly in a sense that it's an insane amount of effort and resources to spend on, basically, blocking unwanted shouting. Obviously the long-term sustainable option is to just kill ads altogether.)

Re: Google starts tracking all your devices in 8 weeks

#126

Post by koolala »

int_19h wrote: post #46
rpastuszak wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is getting trickier: - nowadays (iirc) you can serve/proxy those scripts via your own domain (to circumvent ad blocker blocklists) - there are limitations re the number of blocking rules in Manifest V3 It’s cat and mouse at this stage, we’re getting to the point where blocking ads will be as hard/annoying as, say, installing 3rd party apps on your iPhone. Too much of a hassle even for fairly techie users

I wonder if at this point an AI-based ad blocker that would actually look at the DOM, or maybe even the image, would be viable. Obviously, this requires significantly more resources. But it feels like a more productive use of the hardware power that we already have, compared to the most recent Electron monstrosity.

An AI ad blocker could mute embedded ads and cover them with interest information you want to learn.

Re: Google starts tracking all your devices in 8 weeks

#127

Post by create-username »

chgs wrote: post #65
create-username wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. The browser innocently gives away tons of information for surveillance capitalism corporations to leech. It is a if the web and browser developers lived in an innocent world

The largest browser is owned by a surveillance firm

Yes but chrome has not created new user tracking standards. Every web browser leaks a lot of information

Re: Google starts tracking all your devices in 8 weeks

#128

Post by TheBozzCL »

timbit42 wrote: post #52
TheBozzCL wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personally, I went the nuclear route with a Pihole. My devices can’t talk to Google.

What if they use IPs instead of domain names?

Then you write router-level firewall rules for the IPs you know are safe to fully block. You can do that selectively so you don’t break other devices.

I already do this for local DNS circumvention, which is probably a lot more common than hardcoded IPs.

Re: Google starts tracking all your devices in 8 weeks

#129

Post by mcdeltat »

hyperman1 wrote: post #30

A few weeks ago, I was using my mothers PC. Google was erroneously in French, and no language chooser available. So I checked. Firefox sent a HTTP header with a Dutch preference. She was logged in with her Google account, which had a Dutch language preference. Some geolocation providers put her in Dutch speaking cities of Belgium. Still, the Google Algorithm had decided she would speak French. Plenty of other sites m…

So true. It's funny how the article mentioned "privacy enhancing technologies" - how about instead, we get rid of the disgustingly huge quantity of technology devoted to removing our privacy?!

Re: Google starts tracking all your devices in 8 weeks

#130

Post by kdmtctl »

hyperman1 wrote: post #30

A few weeks ago, I was using my mothers PC. Google was erroneously in French, and no language chooser available. So I checked. Firefox sent a HTTP header with a Dutch preference. She was logged in with her Google account, which had a Dutch language preference. Some geolocation providers put her in Dutch speaking cities of Belgium. Still, the Google Algorithm had decided she would speak French. Plenty of other sites m…

I struggle with this often, but http://www.google.com/ncr does the trick and allow to choose the language later if necessary.
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