Cookies etc.,

Who are you working for, 'Jim'?

mike

This page uses a javascript to report to Google, but I think some sites still hard code it so you can't turn it off. I've hit a few sites that lock you out if javascript is turned off, too.

var gaJsHost = (("https:" == document.location.protocol) ? "https://ssl." : "http://www.");document.write(unescape("%3Cscript src='" + gaJsHost + "google-analytics.com/ga.js' type='text/javascript'%3E%3C/script%3E"));

try { var pageTracker = _gat._getTracker("UA-8740097-1"); pageTracker._trackPageview(); } catch(err) {}

Did ya hafta do that? Now I am sitting here all drooling.

Yep, but certainly not all tricks. That why young buck ask old buck :-)

... which changes all the time in my case. Unless I'd leave the modem on all day, which I don't. So how can they track me?

The Google Analytics scripts send information back to Google, which then provides the website operator with aggregate statistics.

Regarding:

That's certainly not inaccurate. OTOH, it doesn't matter whether you use Google as your search engine or not; the code is still on the web sites which you visit.

FWIW, I browse with JavaScript, cookies and Flash all disabled (I don't mean "blocked", I mean that the options are simply turned off). If people want to run programs or store data, they can do it on their own computers.

The web site operator has that information regardless of whether they use Google Analytics and regardless of any privacy extensions in your browser. You can't view a web page without telling the server which page you want and where to send it (your IP address).

Having a dynamic IP address makes it harder to track you, although not necessarily impossible:

Same here. I only "allow" my bank and credit card accounts. Everything else is by temporary privilege if I need it. ...Jim Thompson

-- | James E.Thompson, CTO | mens | | Analog Innovations, Inc. | et | | Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC's and Discrete Systems | manus | | Phoenix, Arizona 85048 Skype: Contacts Only | | | Voice:(480)460-2350 Fax: Available upon request | Brass Rat | | E-mail Icon at

Democrats are best served up prepared as a hash Otherwise the dogs won't eat them :-)

In practical terms, the only difference compared to cookies is the increased size.

DOM storage can only be accessed via JavaScript, which could provide the same functionality via a combination of cookies and storage on the web server.

I'd be more concerned about "Flash cookies", as these can't be disabled through the Firefox options dialog; you have to use a Flash applet on Adobe's site to control local storage.

True, but at some point it's like having a lock, a deadbolt, a Rottweiler and a Shepherd. The effort just becomes too much and the intruding party choses to move on to easier targets ;-)

Ah, heck! I was hoping it was like gingerbread men with swords or something. ;-)

But just browser cookies? That's such a strawman. A cookie is a little text snippet that the site offers to your browser, which stores it if you accept it, and (at least when I learned about them) they can only be retrieved by the site that set them. A COOKIE CAN'T BE EXECUTED!

To protect yourself from malware, just don't do your day-to-day work as "administrator" - make a restricted user account, and DON'T CLICK ON UNKNOWN LINKS!

It's not that hard; you just have to pay a little attention.

Cheers! Rich

Claiming that the Web Storage database "can only be accessed via JavaScript" can be misinterpreted as this technology being completely harmless and only used under very specific circumstances. As every browser offers a JavaScript implementation and some sites even force the user to enable JavaScript to be able to access their site, claiming that the Web Storage database "can only be accessed via JavaScript" is essentially the same as claiming that it can only be accessed through every browser in the world.

From that, once we realize that there are companies that collect information on essentially all WWW users by injecting their own JavaScript code on all the sites they can manage to access (and as a consequence are able to collect piles on information such as browsing history and personal profiles), providing a juicy RDBMS for them to store and retrieve information from our very own hard drives is something which should trouble some people.

Yes, that's true. Nonetheless, Flash is essentially a gimmick which is essentially losing (if it hasn't already lost) it's relevance in the web while cookies and this Web Storage thingie is based on basic WWW standards, it's present in all major browsers and is already indissociable from the web. To put it in other words, while Flash may be on it's way out, cookies and Web Storage are deeply entrenched in the web and there is essentially no way around them.

Rui Maciel

It's true that the web site operator can register IPs and monitor the cookies his site sets. Yet, what Google Analytics and the sort does is far more insidious and overreaching than that. Google is able to inject Google Analytics scripts on a vast number of sites, which enable it to not only register IPs and monitor cookies but also to cross-reference that data with all the data collected by all the Google Analytics scripts running on a vast number of sites. By doing that, Google is able to create, build up and maintain a profile on every user which, among other things, includes your browsing history and your web habits.

So, in essence, being able to say that "user X logged into my site at Y day" is a whole lot different than "user X has these browsing habits and these personal interests".

Rui Maciel

Essentially there isn't. You may try to mitigate this problem my refusing to run scripts that you haven't explicitly authorized. One way to try to do that is to use NoScript and adblock extensions and configure your browser to delete all data (cache, cookies, web storage, etc..) when closed. Yet, even that doesn't guarantee a 100% success rate.

Rui Maciel

This is leading up to it, though...scary.

mike

Google is trivial compared to Obamacare. Obamacare truly tracks every aspect of your life, and puts it in an internet-accessible database.

The 4th Amendment says you have the right to be secure in your person, house, papers, and effects. Nope, that's changed.

-- Cheers, James Arthur

They still track you by IP address (if you have a static IP, that is).

Wrong.

Dillo doesn't, for one.

-- "For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for nature cannot be fooled." (Richard Feynman)

I don't have a static IP :-)