Privacy

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A place to discuss privacy and freedom in the digital world.

Privacy has become a very important issue in modern society, with companies and governments constantly abusing their power, more and more people are waking up to the importance of digital privacy.

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YouTube adds tracking parameters to shared URLs that can be traced back to individual Google accounts (nitter.net)

submitted 2 years ago by Vexz@kbin.social to c/privacy@lemmy.ml

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[–] i_shot_the_sherry@lemmy.world 85 points 2 years ago (4 children)

I believe Spotify is doing something similar.

Would be nice if social networks and messengers would automatically strip these parameters.

[–] otter@lemmy.ca 42 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (2 children)

Same with Reddit, FB Messenger, Instagram, TikTok... Some of them are harder to spot, like how Reddit now goes reddit.com/r/example/s/8913y4h93

Would be nice if social networks and messengers would automatically strip these parameters.

I started using URLCheck on Android and SO MANY links have some kind of tracker that you can drop and not lose any functionality. Things like Signal (and even Lemmy/Mastodon) could do something similar and throw up a little warning when it encounters a known tracker, then offer to clean the URL for you.

Another advantage is that the clean URLs are a lot more descriptive

[–] i_shot_the_sherry@lemmy.world 6 points 2 years ago (1 children)

I'm using FairEmail on Android. When tapping a link, thr app detects tracking parameters and offers to remove them. I really like that feature and wish other apps would offer something similar.

[–] otter@lemmy.ca 3 points 2 years ago

Oh that's nice! Hopefully more apps integrate that function

[–] otter@lemmy.ca 5 points 2 years ago (1 children)

For example, see the link in the post body here:

https://www.reddit.com/r/OutOfTheLoop/comments/18dsi68/whats_going_on_with_kim_kardashian_and_taylor/

[–] MaximilianKohler@lemmy.world 0 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Why are you linking to reddit...

[–] otter@lemmy.ca 2 points 2 years ago

I was linking to a page where someone unknowingly used a link with a tracker, as an example of what I was talking about

Here's a screenshot if that's better

[–] noodlejetski@lemm.ee 33 points 2 years ago (2 children)

adding this list to uBlock Origin helps: https://github.com/DandelionSprout/adfilt/blob/master/LegitimateURLShortener.txt

[–] cupcakezealot@lemmy.blahaj.zone 8 points 2 years ago

best filter maintainer ever

[–] Skimmer@lemmy.zip 4 points 2 years ago

This list is a must.

[–] jivandabeast@lemmy.browntown.dev 4 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Pretty sure TikTok does it as well

[–] variants@possumpat.io 2 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

That was the first place I noticed it, thought it was really smart of them, someone would send me a meme or whatever and it would show their account at the top. Was impressed that they generate so many links, now they can see who knows who so easily