Anti-fingerprinting extensions tend to make fingerprinting easier

Re:Anti-fingerprinting extensions tend to make fingerprintin... by caconym_ on Thursday December 10, 2020 @05:42PM (#25379796)

Getting browser-fingerprinted is technically the user’s fault in the same way it’s technically my fault if I die in a car crash because of some mechanical defect that I could have detected if I’d just made a habit of regularly dismantling my car to inspect every part of it, applying expert engineering knowledge to identify and fix any dangerous problem(s) (including design defects).

Allowing predatory and/or negligent entities to entrap people with less-than-expert knowledge of the relevant industry/technology/whatever is something we should avoid if our goal is to build a society for the common good. The whole point is to watch each other’s backs, not to create a web of obscure threats where only the truly paranoid can remain safe and avoid being exploited.

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Re:Anti-fingerprinting extensions tend to make fingerprintin... by rhizome on Friday December 11, 2020 @12:46PM (#25388440)

>Allowing predatory and/or negligent entities to entrap people with less-than-expert knowledge of the relevant industry/technology/whatever

Indeed, a lot of companies are paying a lot of people a lot of money to spend a lot of their working hours figuring out newer and more-resilient ways of doing this stuff. How long has it been since persistent Flash cookies? Looks like sometime around 2009:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Local_shared_object#Privacy_co...

I think there's a project out there for an enterprising public-interest researcher to graph how many of these attempts and techniques were developed and popularized after Facebook started allowing people outside of universities to register for an account.

[ Parent | on HN ]