Re:Hey.com is onto something with its tracking-pixel blocker
by xnx on Sunday June 21, 2020 @03:50PM
(#23594814)
Gmail's handling of tracking pixels might be even better, it automatically downloads and caches all images in a email. This has a few benefits: 1) Renders any gmail "open rate" analytics useless 2) Makes the email load faster in your email client since images are coming from Google's fast cache
https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2013/12/gmail...
Re:Hey.com is onto something with its tracking-pixel blocker
by zeroimpl on Sunday June 21, 2020 @11:08PM
(#23597094)
I don't believe this is totally accurate. I've received an email from an online store sent when an order was shipped, it has an image in it which updates according to the shipping status (and now the image shows as delivered).
Either Google has added an exception for this retailer (unlikely) or there is a workaround.
Re:Hey.com is onto something with its tracking-pixel blocker
by shostack on Sunday June 21, 2020 @04:31PM
(#23595150)
Reducing accuracy of open rate data is a double-edged sword. I understand the privacy concerns. But it is exceptionally useful to product and people and writers for intoning UX to know if important emails are getting read (or at least opened).
Re:Hey.com is onto something with its tracking-pixel blocker
by saaaaaam on Monday June 22, 2020 @03:27AM
(#23597989)
Yup. But they still support the feature and sold people on that benefit. So whether the product is still accepting new sign ups is neither here nor there. They are part of the “problem” that they are railing against.
Re:Hey.com is onto something with its tracking-pixel blocker
by gav on Sunday June 21, 2020 @03:27PM
(#23594637)
Whether or not you agree with email tracking, the language feels a bit like propaganda:
"YOU'RE PROTECTED. WE BLOCKED A SPY TRACKER IN THIS THREAD"
"A spy tracker" seems a bit dramatic and it's far from a neutral description. What about just:
"This email contained a tracking image allowing the sender to see if you've opened it, we've blocked that for you."
The main use of this feature is to track open rates so that marketers can improve their marketing efforts. Block them if you disagree, but there's no reason to make it sound so nefarious.
Re:Hey.com is onto something with its tracking-pixel blocker
by Nextgrid on Sunday June 21, 2020 @03:30PM
(#23594678)
It is nefarious if it’s ran by an ad-tech or marketing company. They also collect much more information than just the fact that the email has been opened. IP addresses & user-agents are collected as well.
Re:Hey.com is onto something with its tracking-pixel blocker
by ldoughty on Sunday June 21, 2020 @03:18PM
(#23594564)
Not a dumb question, but not a good answer because it's too abstract (a general concept, but not tied to a particular piece of software/client -- is this a browser, or an email client?)...
The short answer is: Stopping tracking objects requires the request to be stopped before any DNS or HTTP request takes place against that object... and must not be circumvented by other software/addons that then allow it...
For instance, if you block images, but you have another addon/software (e.g. those "website accelerators" that do virtually nothing) that preloads images.. well.. how do the two addons interact? If anything sends that request, you've notified the tracking website.
Why DNS too? If I were an evil company, I'd have both DNS and HTTP checks. If you block images but still for some reason checked the DNS address, I might be able to extract some useful info because you hit uniqueTrackingUUID.example.com, despite not sending the HTTP request.
So, in short, blocking remote images _should_ help, but there's a lot more evil ways to track you... it could even be a url-loaded font (that actually doesn't exist, because it's your UUID for tracking)... or a script... In theory, if you block remote images, your software _hopefully_ blocks other stuff, but that depends on the implementation...
Re:Hey.com is onto something with its tracking-pixel blocker
by Nextgrid on Sunday June 21, 2020 @03:29PM
(#23594658)
I use a good old “boring” email client like Mac Mail and to the best of my knowledge it doesn’t attempt DNS resolution either.
Maybe in-browser clients are different but then it’s more of a problem with that particular implementation than the concept of blocking remote content itself.
Regarding website accelerators, is that really still a thing? Never heard of those.
Re:Hey.com is onto something with its tracking-pixel blocker
by ldoughty on Tuesday June 23, 2020 @08:20AM
(#23612887)
I don't know Mac mail. As for website acceleration, there's many forms.. there's still software people try to push that basically installs add-ons into browsers... Then there's simply add-ons you can download, which could easily do anything.
For mail clients, it comes down to implementation there as well, but it's less likely a major vendor would add tracking protection checkboxes, then fail on them too badly..... Less likely... And they usually don't have add-ons of the like that would be a problem.
Re:Hey.com is onto something with its tracking-pixel blocker
by maps7 on Monday June 22, 2020 @03:34PM
(#23605147)
This is really the only way to 100% know if your email was received. It needs agreement from the recipient though to click the button. If it's beneficial for them then I think they would.
Re:Hey.com is onto something with its tracking-pixel blocker
by ac29 on Monday June 22, 2020 @11:49AM
(#23601544)
A tracking pixel cant possibly tell you if the email was read. It might tell you if it was opened, assuming that it works correctly, but cant differentiate between loading and actually reading. It also might fail to tell you it was opened, for example if the user blocks these trackers.
All in all, its a lousy system. If you absolutely must be sure someone has read your email, you might need to call them.
Re:Hey.com is onto something with its tracking-pixel blocker
by captn3m0 on Sunday June 21, 2020 @05:04PM
(#23595389)
What I find worse is link tracking, since it can’t be as easily bypasses. I have a paid subscription to a newsletter and the publisher said they can’t disable link tracking because SendGrid only offers it as an account wide setting - I checked, it is.
This is the kind of stupidity that makes me hate marketing.
Re:Hey.com is onto something with its tracking-pixel blocker
by sha90 on Tuesday June 23, 2020 @09:39PM
(#23622936)
Can you explain what is worse about link tracking? If you're explicitly making a request to a remote service, how would you expect it to not be tracked?
Re:Hey.com is onto something with its tracking-pixel blocker
by captn3m0 on Wednesday June 24, 2020 @10:14AM
(#23628090)
1. The link becomes unreadable
2. The link now goes to a marketing.newsletter.com instead of example.com/original-story, which gives me a better signal of the quality of the citation. Wouldn't you hate it if every wikipedia citation went to bit.ly instead?
3. My "intent" is to read the information behind the original link, if I can't do that without being tracked by a the sender of the email - I'm less likely to click the link.
4. Email isn't meant to be tracked! Clicking on a link in an email I got should not notify the sender, in any way whatsover. If this is true for my personal emails, why is it not true for company emails?
Re:Hey.com is onto something with its tracking-pixel blocker
by eloisant on Sunday June 21, 2020 @03:44PM
(#23594773)
The vast majority of people will stick using Gmail, so aggregated metrics won't be skewed that much.
However I definitely wants to mess with the fine tracking like Intercom does for example, where they can pull out data about a specific client and see what communication he read or didn't read, how long he stayed on it, etc
https://redant.com.au/how-we-do/cache-busting-gmail-new-imag...
“The simplest system available to send an email to a group of contacts. Track opens and clicks and stay top-of-mind.“
https://highrisehq.com/features/
> As of August 20, 2018, we're no longer accepting new signups for Highrise
https://highrisehq.com/
Not sure that’s valid grounds for criticism. Basecamp never ends support for products, but this one is otherwise sunset.
"YOU'RE PROTECTED. WE BLOCKED A SPY TRACKER IN THIS THREAD"
"A spy tracker" seems a bit dramatic and it's far from a neutral description. What about just:
"This email contained a tracking image allowing the sender to see if you've opened it, we've blocked that for you."
The main use of this feature is to track open rates so that marketers can improve their marketing efforts. Block them if you disagree, but there's no reason to make it sound so nefarious.
Yes. Normal people call this spying and consider it an invasion of privacy.
The short answer is: Stopping tracking objects requires the request to be stopped before any DNS or HTTP request takes place against that object... and must not be circumvented by other software/addons that then allow it...
For instance, if you block images, but you have another addon/software (e.g. those "website accelerators" that do virtually nothing) that preloads images.. well.. how do the two addons interact? If anything sends that request, you've notified the tracking website.
Why DNS too? If I were an evil company, I'd have both DNS and HTTP checks. If you block images but still for some reason checked the DNS address, I might be able to extract some useful info because you hit uniqueTrackingUUID.example.com, despite not sending the HTTP request.
So, in short, blocking remote images _should_ help, but there's a lot more evil ways to track you... it could even be a url-loaded font (that actually doesn't exist, because it's your UUID for tracking)... or a script... In theory, if you block remote images, your software _hopefully_ blocks other stuff, but that depends on the implementation...
Maybe in-browser clients are different but then it’s more of a problem with that particular implementation than the concept of blocking remote content itself.
Regarding website accelerators, is that really still a thing? Never heard of those.
For mail clients, it comes down to implementation there as well, but it's less likely a major vendor would add tracking protection checkboxes, then fail on them too badly..... Less likely... And they usually don't have add-ons of the like that would be a problem.
Sometimes (important notifications) I need to understand whether the email was delivered to the recipient and it was read.
What am I to do? Yes, marketers do piggyback the feature. But it's still useful.
Give me a voluntary receipt system, THEN kill tracking pixels.
https://support.google.com/mail/answer/9413651?hl=en
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/add-and-request-r...
All in all, its a lousy system. If you absolutely must be sure someone has read your email, you might need to call them.
This is the kind of stupidity that makes me hate marketing.
2. The link now goes to a marketing.newsletter.com instead of example.com/original-story, which gives me a better signal of the quality of the citation. Wouldn't you hate it if every wikipedia citation went to bit.ly instead?
3. My "intent" is to read the information behind the original link, if I can't do that without being tracked by a the sender of the email - I'm less likely to click the link.
4. Email isn't meant to be tracked! Clicking on a link in an email I got should not notify the sender, in any way whatsover. If this is true for my personal emails, why is it not true for company emails?
You are really screwing with readable metrics, not only for marketing. But for people who do A-Z for their newsletter.
However I definitely wants to mess with the fine tracking like Intercom does for example, where they can pull out data about a specific client and see what communication he read or didn't read, how long he stayed on it, etc