Would it be possible for a browser or extension to just provide false metadata in order to subvert this type of fingerprinting?
this post was submitted on 18 Feb 2025
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So from what I understand, theres 2 common ways that browsers combat this. Someone add to or correct me if I'm wrong.
- Browsers such as Mull combat this by looking the same as every other browser. If you all look the same, it's hard to tell you apart. I believe this is why people recommend using default window size when using Tor.
Ex: Everyone wearing black pants and hoodies with the facemasks. Extremely hard to tell who is who.
- Browsers such as Brave randomize metadata that fingerprinting collects so that it's more difficult to piece it all together and build a trend/profile on someone.
Ex: look like a dog in one place, a cat in another place. They get data for a dog but that doesn't help build anything if the rest of the data is a cat, hamster, whatever. No way to piece it together to be useful.
In both my examples, there are caveats. Just because everyone dressed the same doesn't mean someone isn't taller or shorter, or skinnier or fatter. There can still be tells to help narrow down. Or a cat that barks like a dog suddenly is more linkable to a dog if that makes sense lol.
In other words it still depends user behavior that can contribute to the effectiveness of these tools.
EDIT: got distracted. To answer your question I don't think so. I think it's more about user behavior blending in or being randomized. I think the only thing an extension would be able to do is possibly randomize the data but I'm unsure of such an extension yet. These aren't the only options, these are just ones I've read about recently. Online behavior, browswr window size, and I'm sure so much more also goes into it. But every little bit helps and is better than nothing.
EDIT2: Added examples for each for clarity.
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Just in time for their prophet, Curtis Yarvin, to be pushing a full-scale surveillance state!
Googlers aren't on our side. They want to rule. They think being a fucking admin on a server makes them cut out to run society.
They want to tear down democracy and basically replace it with administrator rules and access control lists.
Googlers aren’t on our side
They never were, out interests just aligned while they were growing market share. They have that now, so there's no more reason to stay aligned.
Corporations aren't your friend, but they can be momentary allies. People should've bailed once IE was dethroned, but here we are...
But why would any browser accept access to those metadata so freely? I get that programming languages can find out about the environment they are operating in, but why would a browser agree to something like reading installed fonts or extensions without asking the user first? I understand why Chrome does this, but all of the mayor ones and even Firefox?
Firefox has built-in tracking protection.
I know that it has that in theory, but my Firefox just reached a lower score on https://coveryourtracks.eff.org/ (which was posted in this threat, thanks!) than a Safari. Firefox has good tracking protection but has an absolute unique fingerprint, was 100% identifiable as the first on the site, as to Safari, which scored a bit less in tracking but had a not unique fingerprint.
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Further evidence that a Republican government in the USA results in private organisations pushing the bar as far as they can.
In Reagan's time it was Wall Street. Now it's Silicon Valley.
You want private organisations working for your benefit and not that of their shareholders? You need a government that actually has the gumption to challenge them. The current US government is 4 years of a surrender flag flying on the white house.
Or we could bin off this fucking failed neoliberal experiment, but that's apparently a bit controversial for far too many people
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I go to pornhub every morning to check out the articles. Lately I've noticed that they have exactly the kind of articles I'm interested in always at the top two rows and then a bunch of stuff I'm not really into elsewhere. They are definitely testing stuff.
I too go to pornhub for the articles.
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Good thing I erased Google out of my life a decade ago meaning I can much easier block even more of their everywhere present garbage and not have issues.
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new? isn't this at least like a decade old method of tracking?
Using Mullvad Browser + Mullvad VPN could mitigate this a little bit. Because if you use it as intended (don’t modify Mullvad browser after installation) , all Mullvad users would have the same browser fingerprint and IPs from the same pool.
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