Comment by ruszki
12 hours ago
Similarly. My browser was carefully containerized, with a ton of anti fingerprinting measures, VPN, Linux, Librewolf, everything. Even on my phone, I restricted whatever possible. Then one day I went to the YouTube main page, and I saw that Google somehow got to know that I played Minecraft again after a decade. I gave up right there. I suffered to avoid this, and it was pointless. I knew at that point already that probably all my PI is public information anyway, but I wanted to restrict whatever possible, and no, everybody sells my data anyway, and it seems that avoiding fingerprinting is impossible without turning off the internet completely, and ditching smart phones.
> Google somehow got to know that I played Minecraft again after a decade. [...] I knew at that point already that probably all my PI is public information anyway
How are you jumping from Minecraft (probably one of the most watchtime-generating content types out there) being displayed on your main page to… your personal information being known to everyone?
It wasn't a jump. At that time (about a year ago), I already knew that almost all of my traditional PI is leaked (phone numbers, ID numbers, etc), so I tried to prevent to leak my thoughts further. Basically my last non-public PI. And I tried that for years. And I'm quite sure after my trials, that it's impossible without giving up the internet. My traditional PI would leak even if I don't use the internet at all, since for example one time they leaked from my employer at that time. That's a lost cause even with that sacrifice.
Your data is still out there, just compartmentalized so each outside party only has a bit. It turns out that's a losing strategy when each outside party decides to cooperate with every other and pool/share/sell that data uniquely attached to you.
Even porn ads are linked with your normal browsing
because it’s the same process of intermediaries accumulating, inferring and sharing data to each other
intermediaries that will be compromised
> because it’s the same process of intermediaries accumulating, inferring and sharing data to each other
Except that YouTube doesn't need any of that to recommend Minecraft videos to you. One mundane explanation that seems more likely is that it's the type of content that on average works best on people they don't yet have information on.
Reminds me a little of these "phones listen to everything we say, otherwise I wouldn't have been shown this ad" anecdotes that don't hold up against empiric evidence.
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>My browser was carefully containerized, with a ton of anti fingerprinting measures, VPN, Linux, Librewolf, everything
Doesn't that just make your browser very unique?
Yes. Its a fingerprinting paradox that the more you do to obfuscate the better they can pick you out of the crowd.
It is unique in a new way every page view.
It's way better to do that than hope that you've managed to cover every possible means of fingerprinting. When trying to make your fingerprint as common as possible it only takes a single consistent data point to identify you, and new techniques pop up all the time. TOR browser is a good example of what not to do.
>Then one day I went to the YouTube main page, and I saw that Google somehow got to know that I played Minecraft again after a decade
Did you play minecraft on the same network? If so, I'm not sure why the results are surprising or why it would negate all your efforts. If someone else played minecraft on your network you would also see a minecraft video on your main page I would imagine.
That's worse. My family or housemates can infer what activity I've been up to online by watching their YouTube recommendations?
If your family or housemates wanted to know what you did online they could just flash DD-WRT onto the router and turn on logging.
You are talking about a network which is used by 10-100-1000 thousands of people. Yet, they knew when I started to play Minecraft. With this logic, I should see Minecraft videos all the time, but I didn't, for over a decade.