URL shorteners set ad tracking cookies

Post by Ntrails » Tue, Jan 05, 2021, 1:52 PM UTC

TimLeland wrote: post #87

samb1729 wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is a shame that T.LY displays only the footer without JavaScript enabled instead of degrading gracefully. Surely a plain HTML form that POSTs should suffice? I'm not sure how much work it would require for you to support this, but it would help cement your place as a good web actor if you're so inclined!

Sorry about that. I honestly didn't think anyone browsed the web without javascript enabled. How common is that? We do offer a simple to use api that you could build on top of to shorten link. Also an extension that offers the ability to shorten a url in one click. API Docs: https://t.ly/docs/ Extension: https://t.ly/extension

Post by pgl » Wed, Jan 13, 2021, 12:35 PM UTC

TimLeland wrote: post #51

This is really interesting. I suppose tiny url gets a kicked back from their ad network for this. I'm the creator of the URL shortener (T.LY) and a Link Unshortener tool. I spend most of my development time fighting bad actors. My goal is to have a legitimate competitor to bitly that people benefit from. We do not set any cookies on redirects but do use cookies for authentication for users. T.LY: https://t.ly/ Link U…

    $ curl -Is https://t.ly/ | grep -ic set-cookie
    3