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New Ways To Track Internet Browsing
COLLECTED BY Arthur T Knackerbracket aka 'The StoryBot' - NEEDS EDITING
Interesting research on web tracking: "Who Left Open the Cookie Jar? A Comprehensive Evaluation of Third-Party Cookie Policies [wholeftopenthecookiejar.eu] [PDF 342KB]
In this paper, we evaluate the effectiveness of these defense mechanisms by leveraging a framework that automatically evaluates the enforcement of the policies imposed to third-party requests. By applying our framework, which generates a comprehensive set of test cases covering various web mechanisms, we identify several flaws in the policy implementations of the 7 browsers and 46 browser extensions that were evaluated. We find that even built-in protection mechanisms can be circumvented by multiple novel techniques we discover. Based on these results, we argue that our proposed framework is a much-needed tool to detect bypasses and evaluate solutions to the exposed leaks. Finally, we analyze the origin of the identified bypass techniques, and find that these are due to a variety of implementation, configuration and design flaws.
The researchers discovered many new tracking techniques that work despite all existing anonymous browsing tools. These have not yet been seen in the wild, but that will change soon.
I am shocked, shocked that browser industry that is either directly controlled or funded by data aggregators are lousy at preventing pervasive tracking. This is like expecting locks given away for free by a representative of Den of Thieves to be effective at resisting its membership.
In response to K.S. I might actually trust the den of thieves more since they don't want competition. They'll give themselves access but intentionally try to keep others out. And once they take your goods, the damage is done.
In contrast Google wants your information precisely so they can sell it to other people to your continued detriment.
