• WarmSoda@lemm.ee
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    1 year ago

    Are there really people that think incognito does anything but clear your session history and cookies?

    • balderdash@lemmy.zipOP
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      1 year ago

      You’d be surprised. Lemmy is more tech-literate than the average internet user

      • WarmSoda@lemm.ee
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        1 year ago

        Yeah you’re probably right. I saw someone the other day that thinks duckduckgo is a VPN

      • captainlezbian@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        The website that’s solution to computer problems is to switch to linux? We’re more tech literate than most people?

        • Guy_Fieris_Hair@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Yes, the average person doesn’t know how to install Linux or what a distro is. That’s a fact. If you can successfully switch to Linux you are BY FAR more tech literate than most. Doesn’t mean you’re smart though.

    • Psychodelic@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Are there really people that think there aren’t people that think incognito does something more than clear your session history and cookies?

      • PixxlMan@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Are there really people who think that there aren’t people who think that there really are people that think there aren’t people that think incognito does something more than clear your session history and cookies?

    • neutron
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      1 year ago

      You’d be surprised. There are college students with no notion of files and directories/folders… even in computer engineering.

      Speaking of incognito mode, many users, young or old, have no basic knowledge of how internet works (server, client, web browser…) and jumped straight into smartphones. Many can and will confuse the state of ‘leaving no trace behind after’ vs ‘not being watched now’.

  • popcap200@lemmy.ml
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    1 year ago

    In all seriousness. I know the purpose of incognito. I use it because

    A) It’s easy to visit websites when gift shipping so you don’t have to logoff/into sites.

    B) I don’t have to worry about wiping my history haha.

    • Norgur@kbin.social
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      1 year ago

      And the website owner… oh, and your ISP, and the search engine provider and… well, let’s cut this short: The only person you are incognito to is yo mama when she wants to see your browser history.

      • Rikudou_Sage@lemmings.world
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        1 year ago

        Well, to the website owner you are incognito, as well as to your search engine provider (unless, of course, your search engine provider is also your browser owner, but that would be stupid, wouldn’t it?).

        You’re right with the ISP, though you can use VPN for that.

        • Norgur@kbin.social
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          1 year ago

          I hate to be the one who tears the band-aid off, but… what do you think “incognito mode” does? And how do you think do search engine providers and website owners identify you on the web?

          All “incognito mode” does is ignore any existing browser cache and delete it’s own cache after the window is closed. So you are logged out, yes. But that doesn’t mean anything. Any browser-fingerprint, anything else will be more or less the same: IP, OS, Screen size, combination of browser and OS version, etc.

          Google will know who visited. Facebook will know who visited.

          • Rikudou_Sage@lemmings.world
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            1 year ago

            And it has separate storage for cookies, local storage, session storage and generally all other storage. And in Firefox, the list of plugins is also different (which is also a source of fingerprinting). If I’m not mistaken, the canvas and similar fingerprints were patched a while ago.

            IP is pretty much irrelevant, hundreds of people can easily share an IP.

            So no, Google and Facebook won’t know who visited.

            • joneskind@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              Incognito mode doesn’t hide your IP address, nor your user-agent, nor your operating system and its exact version, nor anything your browser/system is willing to share, like position, apps installed, photographs, contacts etc.

              IP is pretty much irrelevant, hundreds of people can easily share an IP.

              LOL. Absolutely not. An IP address is unique to your internet line and can’t be shared. Some internet providers will even dynamically change your IP address from time to time (usually between a few weeks). So, until you live in a hundreds of people village sharing a single box… you know what I mean.

              And it has separate storage for cookies, local storage, session storage and generally all other storage

              indexedDB, file system, localStorage and sessionStorage access is strictly domain based data, thus already separated. Only third party cookies can be shared across domains.

              I’m a web developer in an adtech company. GDPR prevent us to store any type of data on the user’s computer. We use incognito mode to reset the cookie consent (for development purposes). The only thing incognito mode can do is preventing websites to directly trade user information. It doesn’t prevent them to get and store any information. One of the legal role of GDPR is to prevent websites to store and trade user information (among other things).

              Even disabling JavaScript can’t prevent the server to get and store enough information to identify you, as everything is logged. The header of any HTTP Request already gives a lot.

              So no, Google and Facebook won’t know who visited.

              Google Ad Manager is installed everywhere. A single script that communicates every single of your interactions, from which browser, which location, which OS, which computer chip etc. You’re naked. Incognito doesn’t change anything.

              • Rikudou_Sage@lemmings.world
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                1 year ago

                What a coincidence, I’m an architect in an adtech company!

                So, IPs can and are shared. For example because there’s hardly enough for every device connected. And yes, I used to live in a village where everyone had the same IP. But that’s beyond the point, every device on your home network has the same IP and ad companies don’t really want to have bad data about you, which would happen if anyone actually used IP for tracking.

                • Ghoelian@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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                  1 year ago

                  I thought the way fingerprinting works is to try to get a bunch of semi-personal information, which together can identify a single person?

                  Like there’s plenty of people using a 1920x1080p display. Doesn’t stop companies from using that as part of their fingerprinting.

                  Sure, your entire town might share an IP. That just means you’ve narrowed your search field from the entire world to one town.

                • joneskind@lemmy.world
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                  1 year ago

                  Being an architect doesn’t mean you understand the codebase.

                  By the way, having 1000 people’s IP changing at the exact same time makes it even easier for fingerprinting, because you only have to get one user’s location to get the 999 others.

                  For example because there’s hardly enough for every device connected

                  There are 4,294,967,296 IPv4 address (232) and 340,282,366,920,938,463,463,374,607,431,768,211,456 IPv6 addresses (2128)

                  So… yeah… sure…

  • Koof_on_the_Roof@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Incognito mode just switches on a ton more tracking cause everyone wants to know what your secret searches are, rather than the boring shit you usually search!