Third-Party Web Tracking: Policy and Technology
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The Web Never Forgets: Persistent Tracking Mechanisms in the Wild
The Web Never Forgets: Persistent Tracking Mechanisms in the Wild Gunes Acar1, Christian Eubank2, Steven Englehardt2, Marc Juarez1 Arvind Narayanan2, Claudia Diaz1 1KU Leuven, ESAT/COSIC and iMinds, Leuven, Belgium {name.surname}@esat.kuleuven.be 2Princeton University {cge,ste,arvindn}@cs.princeton.edu ABSTRACT 1. INTRODUCTION We present the first large-scale studies of three advanced web tracking mechanisms — canvas fingerprinting, evercookies A 1999 New York Times article called cookies compre and use of “cookie syncing” in conjunction with evercookies. hensive privacy invaders and described them as “surveillance Canvas fingerprinting, a recently developed form of browser files that many marketers implant in the personal computers fingerprinting, has not previously been reported in the wild; of people.” Ten years later, the stealth and sophistication of our results show that over 5% of the top 100,000 websites tracking techniques had advanced to the point that Edward employ it. We then present the first automated study of Felten wrote “If You’re Going to Track Me, Please Use Cook evercookies and respawning and the discovery of a new ev ies” [18]. Indeed, online tracking has often been described ercookie vector, IndexedDB. Turning to cookie syncing, we as an “arms race” [47], and in this work we study the latest present novel techniques for detection and analysing ID flows advances in that race. and we quantify the amplification of privacy-intrusive track The tracking mechanisms we study are advanced in that ing practices due to cookie syncing. they are hard to control, hard to detect and resilient Our evaluation of the defensive techniques used by to blocking or removing. -
Netscape Guide by Yahoo!
Netscape Guide By Yahoo! Now Available New Customizable Internet Information and Navigation Service Launched by Netscape and Yahoo! SANTA CLARA, CA and MOUNTAIN VIEW, CA -- April 29, 1997 -- Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO) and Netscape Communications Corporation (NASDAQ: NSCP) today launched Netscape Guide by Yahoo!, a new personalized Internet navigation service designed to provide Internet users with a central source of sites, news and events on the Web. The Guide features customizable sections for several popular information categories, including Business, Finance, Entertainment, Sports, Computers & Internet, Shopping and Travel. Yahoo! plans to expand the service with additional categories in the future, including local information. Netscape Guide by Yahoo! replaces the Destinations section of the Netscape Internet Site and is immediately accessible through Netscape's Internet site (http://home.netscape.com), from the "Guide" button on the Netscape Communicator toolbar and from the "Destinations" button on Netscape Navigator 3.0. Users accessing Destinations will be automatically directed to Netscape Guide by Yahoo!. "Netscape Guide by Yahoo! gives Internet users quick and easy access to the most popular information areas on the Web, all from one central location," said Jeff Mallett, Yahoo!'s senior vice president of business operations. "It also provides Web content providers and advertisers a unique opportunity to reach targeted and growing audiences." "Accessible to the more than four million daily visitors to the Netscape Internet site and the over 50 million users of Netscape client software, Netscape Guide by Yahoo! will direct users to the online sites, news and information they need," said Jennifer Bailey, vice president of electronic marketing at Netscape. -
Social Media Analytics
MEDIA DEVELOPMENT Social media analytics A practical guidebook for journalists and other media professionals Imprint PUBLISHER EDITORS Deutsche Welle Dr. Dennis Reineck 53110 Bonn Anne-Sophie Suntrop Germany SCREENSHOTS RESPONSIBLE Timo Lüge Carsten von Nahmen Helge Schroers Petra Berner PUBLISHED AUTHOR June 2019 Timo Lüge © DW Akademie MEDIA DEVELOPMENT Social media analytics A practical guidebook for journalists and other media professionals INTRODUCTION Introduction Having a successful online presence is becoming more and In part 2, we will look at some of the basics of social media more important for media outlets all around the world. In analysis. We’ll explore what different social media metrics 2018, 435 million people in Africa had access to the Internet mean and which are the most important. and 191 million of them were using social media.1 Today, Africa is one of the fastest growing regions for Internet access and Part 3 looks briefly at the resources you should have in place social media use. to effectively analyze your online communication. For journalists, this means new and exciting opportunities to Part 4 is the main part of the guide. In this section, we are connect with their › audiences. Passive readers, viewers and looking at Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and WhatsApp and will listeners are increasingly becoming active participants in a show you how to use free analytics tools to find out more dialogue that includes journalists and other community mem- about your communication and your audience. Instagram is bers. At the same time, social media is consuming people’s not covered in this guide because, at the time of writing, only attention: Time that used to be spent listening to the radio very few DW Akademie partners in Africa were active on the is now spent scrolling through Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, platform. -
Do Not Track a Nokia Browser Look
Do Not Track Nokia Browser Position - Vikram Malaiya Copyright: Nokia Corporation, 2011 Our understanding of Do Not Track (DNT) • DNT is a technology to enables users to opt out of third-party web tracking • No agreed upon definition of DNT. There are currently 3 major technology proposals for responding to third-party privacy concern. 1. Stanford University and Mozilla’s DNT HTTP Header technique. 2. Blacklist based technique such as Microsoft’s ‘Tracking Protection’ which is part of IE9 3. Network Advertising Initiative’s model of a per company opt-out cookie. Opt-out cookie approach is being promoted by Google. DNT as HTTP Header The Browser adds ‘DNT’/ ‘X-Do-Not-Track’ to its http header. The header is sent out to the server with every web request. This header acts as a signal to the server suggesting that the user wishes to opt out of tracking. Adoption: Firefox 4, IE9 DNT as HTTP Header • Pros: – Scope: Server could apply restrictions to all third party entities and tracking mechanisms – Persistent: No reconfiguration needed once set – Simple: Easy to implement on the browser side • Cons: – Only work as long as the server honors users preferences – No way to enforce national regulations/legislations to servers located beyond country boundaries Block(Black) List / Tracking Protection This is a consumer opt-in mechanism which blocks web connections from known tracking domains that are compiled on a list. First party Third party Adoption: ‘Tracking Protection’ in Internet Explorer 9 cy.analytix.com The downloadable Tracking allow Protection Lists enable IE9 xy.ads.com consumers to control what deny third-party site content can deny track them when they’re ads.tracker.com Tracking Protection online. -
The Internet and Web Tracking
Grand Valley State University ScholarWorks@GVSU Technical Library School of Computing and Information Systems 2020 The Internet and Web Tracking Tim Zabawa Grand Valley State University Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.gvsu.edu/cistechlib ScholarWorks Citation Zabawa, Tim, "The Internet and Web Tracking" (2020). Technical Library. 355. https://scholarworks.gvsu.edu/cistechlib/355 This Project is brought to you for free and open access by the School of Computing and Information Systems at ScholarWorks@GVSU. It has been accepted for inclusion in Technical Library by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks@GVSU. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Tim Zabawa 12/17/20 Capstone Project Cover Page: 1. Introduction 2 2. How we are tracked online 2 2.1 Cookies 3 2.2 Browser Fingerprinting 4 2.3 Web Beacons 6 3. Defenses Against Web Tracking 6 3.1 Cookies 7 3.2 Browser Fingerprinting 8 3.3 Web Beacons 9 4. Technological Examples 10 5. Why consumer data is sought after 27 6. Conclusion 28 7. References 30 2 1. Introduction: Can you remember the last time you didn’t visit at least one website throughout your day? For most people, the common response might be “I cannot”. Surfing the web has become such a mainstay in our day to day lives that a lot of us have a hard time imagining a world without it. What seems like an endless trove of data is right at our fingertips. On the surface, using the Internet seems to be a one-sided exchange of information. We, as users, request data from companies and use it as we deem fit. -
Adchoices? Compliance with Online Behavioral Advertising Notice and Choice Requirements
AdChoices? Compliance with Online Behavioral Advertising Notice and Choice Requirements Saranga Komanduri, Richard Shay, Greg Norcie, Blase Ur, Lorrie Faith Cranor March 30, 2011 (revised October 7, 2011) CMU-CyLab-11-005 CyLab Carnegie Mellon University Pittsburgh, PA 15213 AdChoices? Compliance with Online Behavioral Advertising Notice and Choice Requirements Saranga Komanduri, Richard Shay, Greg Norcie, Blase Ur, Lorrie Faith Cranor Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA {sarangak, rshay, ganorcie, bur, lorrie}@cmu.edu Abstract. Online behavioral advertisers track users across websites, often without users' knowledge. Over the last twelve years, the online behavioral advertising industry has responded to the resulting privacy concerns and pressure from the FTC by creating private self- regulatory bodies. These include the Network Advertising Initiative (NAI) and an umbrella organization known as the Digital Advertising Alliance (DAA). In this paper, we enumerate the DAA and NAI notice and choice requirements and check for compliance with those requirements by examining NAI members' privacy policies and reviewing ads on the top 100 websites. We also test DAA and NAI opt-out mechanisms and categorize how their members define opting out. Our results show that most members are in compliance with some of the notice and choice requirements, but two years after the DAA published its Self-Regulatory Principles, there are still numerous instances of non-compliance. Most examples of non- compliance are related to the ``enhanced notice” requirement, which requires advertisers to mark behavioral ads with a link to further information and a means of opting out. Revised October 7, 2011. Keywords: Online behavioral advertising; privacy; consumer choice; notice; public policy 1 Introduction The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) defines online behavioral advertising (OBA) as “the practice of tracking consumers' activities online to target advertising.”1 The FTC has been examining ways to reduce the privacy concerns associated with OBA for over a decade. -
Netscape 6.2.3 Software for Solaris Operating Environment
What’s New in Netscape 6.2 Netscape 6.2 builds on the successful release of Netscape 6.1 and allows you to do more online with power, efficiency and safety. New is this release are: Support for the latest operating systems ¨ BETTER INTEGRATION WITH WINDOWS XP q Netscape 6.2 is now only one click away within the Windows XP Start menu if you choose Netscape as your default browser and mail applications. Also, you can view the number of incoming email messages you have from your Windows XP login screen. ¨ FULL SUPPORT FOR MACINTOSH OS X Other enhancements Netscape 6.2 offers a more seamless experience between Netscape Mail and other applications on the Windows platform. For example, you can now easily send documents from within Microsoft Word, Excel or Power Point without leaving that application. Simply choose File, “Send To” to invoke the Netscape Mail client to send the document. What follows is a more comprehensive list of the enhancements delivered in Netscape 6.1 CONFIDENTIAL UNTIL AUGUST 8, 2001 Netscape 6.1 Highlights PR Contact: Catherine Corre – (650) 937-4046 CONFIDENTIAL UNTIL AUGUST 8, 2001 Netscape Communications Corporation ("Netscape") and its licensors retain all ownership rights to this document (the "Document"). Use of the Document is governed by applicable copyright law. Netscape may revise this Document from time to time without notice. THIS DOCUMENT IS PROVIDED "AS IS" WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND. IN NO EVENT SHALL NETSCAPE BE LIABLE FOR INDIRECT, SPECIAL, INCIDENTAL, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES OF ANY KIND ARISING FROM ANY ERROR IN THIS DOCUMENT, INCLUDING WITHOUT LIMITATION ANY LOSS OR INTERRUPTION OF BUSINESS, PROFITS, USE OR DATA. -
Global Compliance of Cookie-Bassed Web Analytics Activities
Global compliance of GLOBALcookie-bassed COMPLIANCEweb analytics oactivitiesf cookie-based web analytics activities Finding a cross-border compliance solution [Version 3.0 (April 2012). for cookie-based web analytics activities should be on the agenda of every company doing business online, as well as web analytics software vendors, online content publishers and online advertisers. This paper focuses on EU cookie regulations, US-based Do Not Track initiatives and other worldwide privacy initiatives, in search of a series of steps to aid us in achieving global compliance. INDEX 1 The technical and business need for 5 cookies A world built on cookies 5 Cookie types and threats 6 2 The social dilemma 9 3 A short history of worldwide cookie- 11 related privacy protection 4 The EU regulatory challenge 15 Opt-out vs. Opt-in 15 Yes I do, Don´t I? 16 Calling a spade a spade: national 17 implementations Which law applies to you? 19 5 Technical and legal solutions for 21 cross-border compliance of web analytics activities A proposed approach to the new 21 A document by legal framework Divisadero. All rights reserved. 21 www.divisadero.eu Building a minimum common denominator Author Technical and practical solutions 23 Sergio Maldonado Design by ANNEX: Cookie inventory and 25 Alexia Méndez 6 classification audit form Global compliance of cookie-based web analytics activities 3 1. THE TECHNICAL AND BUSINESS NEED FOR COOKIES sessions, registrations and logins, online banking sessions, electronic government applications… and virtually every online action that goes beyond user-dissociated displays of information. But cookies are also used for other purposes: by allowing us to tie multiple page visualizations to the same anonymous browser, they enable online audience measurement concepts such as “visit” and “visitor”. -
E Cost of Ad Blocking Pagefair and Adobe 2015 Ad Blocking Report
!e cost of ad blocking PageFair and Adobe 2015 Ad Blocking Report Introduction In the third annual ad blocking report, PageFair, with the help of Adobe, provides updated data on the scale and growth of ad blocking so"ware usage and highlights the global and regional economic impact associated with it. Additionally, this report explores the early indications surrounding the impact of ad blocking within the mobile advertising space and how mobile will change the ad blocking landscape. Table of Contents 3. Key insights 8. Effect of ad blocking by industry 13. A"erword 4. Global ad blocking growth 9. Google Chrome still the main driver of ad 14. Background 5. Usage of ad blocking so"ware in the United block growth 15. Methodology States 10. Mobile is yet to be a factor in ad blocking 16. Tables 6. Usage of ad blocking so"ware in Europe growth 17. Tables 7. !e cost of blocking ads 11. Mobile will facilitate future ad blocking growth 12. Reasons to start using an ad blocker PAGEFAIR AND ADOBE | 2015 Ad Blocking Report 2 Key Insights More consumers block ads, continuing the strong growth rates seen during 2013 and 2014. 41% YoY global growth Q2 2014 - Q2 2015 !e "ndings • Globally, the number of people using ad blocking so"ware grew by 41% year over year. • 16% of the US online population blocked ads during Q2 2015. • Ad block usage in the United States grew 48% during the past year, increasing to 45 million monthly active 45 million users (MAUs) during Q2 2015. Average MAUs in the United • Ad block usage in Europe grew by 35% during the past year, increasing to 77 million monthly active users States Q2 2015 during Q2 2015. -
Zeszyty T 13 2018 Tytulowa I Redakcyjna
POLITECHNIKA KOSZALIŃSKA Zeszyty Naukowe Wydziału Elektroniki i Informatyki Nr 13 KOSZALIN 2018 Zeszyty Naukowe Wydziału Elektroniki i Informatyki Nr 13 ISSN 1897-7421 ISBN 978-83-7365-501-0 Przewodniczący Uczelnianej Rady Wydawniczej Zbigniew Danielewicz Przewodniczący Komitetu Redakcyjnego Aleksy Patryn Komitet Redakcyjny Krzysztof Bzdyra Walery Susłow Wiesław Madej Józef Drabarek Adam Słowik Strona internetowa https://weii.tu.koszalin.pl/nauka/zeszyty-naukowe Projekt okładki Tadeusz Walczak Skład, łamanie Maciej Bączek © Copyright by Wydawnictwo Uczelniane Politechniki Koszalińskiej Koszalin 2018 Wydawnictwo Uczelniane Politechniki Koszalińskiej 75-620 Koszalin, ul. Racławicka 15-17 Koszalin 2018, wyd. I, ark. wyd. 5,72, format B-5, nakład 100 egz. Druk: INTRO-DRUK, Koszalin Spis treści Damian Giebas, Rafał Wojszczyk ..................................................................................................................................................... 5 Zastosowanie wybranych reprezentacji graficznych do analizy aplikacji wielowątkowych Grzegorz Górski, Paweł Koziołko ...................................................................................................................................................... 27 Semantyczne ataki na aplikacje internetowe wykorzystujące język HTML i arkusze CSS Grzegorz Górski, Paweł Koziołko ..................................................................................................................................................... 37 Analiza skuteczności wybranych metod -
Improving Transparency Into Online Targeted Advertising
AdReveal: Improving Transparency Into Online Targeted Advertising Bin Liu∗, Anmol Sheth‡, Udi Weinsberg‡, Jaideep Chandrashekar‡, Ramesh Govindan∗ ‡Technicolor ∗University of Southern California ABSTRACT tous and cover a large fraction of a user’s browsing behav- To address the pressing need to provide transparency into ior, enabling them to build comprehensive profiles of their the online targeted advertising ecosystem, we present AdRe- online interests. This widespread tracking of users and the veal, a practical measurement and analysis framework, that subsequent personalization of ads have received a great deal provides a first look at the prevalence of different ad target- of negative press; users associate adjectives such as creepy ing mechanisms. We design and implement a browser based and scary with the practice [18], primarily because they lack tool that provides detailed measurements of online display insight into how their data is being collected and used. ads, and develop analysis techniques to characterize the con- Our paper seeks to provide transparency into the targeted textual, behavioral and re-marketing based targeting mecha- advertising ecosystem, a capability that has not been ex- nisms used by advertisers. Our analysis is based on a large plored so far. We seek to enable end-users to reason about dataset consisting of measurements from 103K webpages why ads of a certain category are being displayed to them. and 139K display ads. Our results show that advertisers fre- Consider a user that repeatedly receives ads about cures for a quently target users based on their online interests; almost particularly private ailment. The user currently lacks a way half of the ad categories employ behavioral targeting. -
The Ultimate Guide to Web Hosting for Beginners. Don't Be
Welcome to the Ultimate Guide to Web Hosting for Beginners. Don’t be fooled by the name – this is a top-notch exhaustive resource, for new website owners and veterans alike, created by hosting experts with years of experience. Our mission: to help you save money and avoid hosting scams. Your part: please be kind and share this guide with someone. We made it to help you choose the right hosting, make the most of it and save big bucks on the long run. Here’s what this guide covers: VPS, Cloud and Dedicated hosting: types, pricing and technologies How to choose the right OS SEO and web hosting Installing WordPress in 5 easy steps The common dirty tricks of web hosting companies (and how to avoid them) The Most important features in shared web hosting To make the most of the information we’ve gathered here for you, we recommend taking these articles one at a time. Be sure to keep a notepad and a pen with you, because there will be some stuff you may want to write down. And now, 1. We hope you enjoy reading this guide as much as we had enjoyed writing it 2. Keep safe out there, and open your eyes to avoid scams and dirty tricks 3. Feel free to ask us anything. We’re at http://facebook.com/HostTracer 4. Please consider sharing your hosting experience with us on our community, at http://hosttracer.com Good luck! Idan Cohen, Eliran Ouzan, Max Ostryzhko and Amos Weiskopf Table of Contents Chapter 1: Introduction, and a Hosting Glossary .................................................