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DuckDuckGo Now Fingerprinting Visitors

posted by chromas on Thursday January 10 2019, @04:12PM   
from the time-to-switch-to-dodododogo dept.

upstart writes:

Submitted via IRC for Bytram

Is this for real? DuckDuckGo has grown in popularity primarily on its claim: We don't track you. Is this no longer true?

DuckDuckGo now fingerprinting visitors

DuckDuckGo is using the Canvas DOMRect API on their search engine. Canvas is used to make unique geometry measurements on target browsers, and DOMRect API uses rectangles. This can be verified with the CanvasBlocker Firefox add-on by Korbinian Kapsner. DDG has recently been redirecting some website navigations to cute pictures with remarks about their privacy promises. The organization is now seeking to expand their Internet presence. DDG are without question data brokers, and commercial websites that make promises like DDG does will not survive for long if they actually keep them.

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Original Submission

• Re:link spoofing in search engine results (Score: 3, Interesting) by bzipitidoo on Thursday January 10 2019, @07:29PM

  by bzipitidoo (4388) on Thursday January 10 2019, @07:29PM (#784624) Journal

  I'm using Firefox 64. I wonder if it's the JavaScript. I am not using NoScript, and I can certainly believe Google serving up a heavily JavaScripted page if it detects that you allow it, and a plain HTML page if you block scripts. And if it is JavaScript, probably it can set the hover text to anything it wants. One other clue I noticed is that there is no "https://" at the start of the hover text that a Google search presents to the user.

  Now, how much time do I want to spend on further investigation? Lot of other things to do....

  Parent

  Starting Score:	1		point
  Moderation		+1
  Interesting=1, Total=1
  Extra 'Interesting' Modifier		0
  Karma-Bonus Modifier		+1
  Total Score:		3