Websites telling me what I can do with my own browser so they can have their pointless cookies
Websites telling me what I can do with my own browser so they can have their pointless cookies
It's not even "Incognito" (what a misnomer too), this is a Gecko-based browser
I feel like for straw poll it's more valid, they probably do it to try and avoid people voting more than once.
A bit yes, but any technique like that can be used to fingerprint and deanonymize users.
Yes, but that's the only way you can trust electronic voting, by removing anonymity
Yes, but if you wanted to, you can write a script that mass votes and bypasses this (if there is no captcha)
Cookies are not evil per se... but data mining companies made them like that.
I'm administrating an online store and cookies are responsible for the customer's cart, plus their user session / logged in state.
As an admin I adhere to the "golden rule", thus there are no creepy trackers on store. I don't like them and I don't want customers to face the same thing on websites that I manage.
That said, cookies are needed for user session & fraud protection. Instead of nuking cookies we shall kick the trackers out.
Yea but all that kind of functionality can work with (permanent) private mode as well. I don't use a lot of web services so I can log in when I need or make a pwa like with Lemmy here.
True. It can work with private mode, but not with browser set to block all cookies, or to nuke JavaScript 😅
"One vote per IP-address" - So they already tackled the problem that people can vote more then once.
Straight-up asshole design.
Let Mozilla know by filing a report on Webcompat.
I'll look into that. I believe web sites shouldn't have any way to detect private mode, right?
I mean, of all sites, polls make the most sense to require cookies to avoid duplicate votes.
Wouldn't the better solution be to keep a log of previous client IPs, on the server side? Sure, VPN will circumvent it, but it's much easier for me to clear a cookie 100 times then to connect to 100 different VPNs.
The EU has made logging IP addresses generally illegal.
IP blocking would be really bad if the poll is for students staying in dorms at a university or for people on the same cell carrier.
IPs rotate too often and it would only allow 1 vote per modem.
CGNAT is a thing with regards to IPv4 addresses. So that won't work.
Cookies are really inappropriate for this use..
You need to track the user for a poll. Sessions don't work since private browsing enables duplicate votes. Tracking the IP can block users from the same network/wifi. Cookies get auto-sent and browser storage is only clientside. Really not many more options aside from making an account on a site and logging in. I find it a pretty reasonable solution actually.
That's when I stop giving them traffic. There's far too many alternatives to do otherwise.
Enter.
"NOPE"
clicks back
And proceed to chose next search result.
There's an extension that allows you to hide incognito mode from websites called Hide Private Mode I'm not sure why browsers don't do this by default (maybe it's some funny compliance thing) it would greatly improve privacy.
Thx. It's weird, but I guess that's now part of Firefox now, to be hypocrites.
Also why the heck does the browser need to ping Google every time I launch a private session? I can't even fathom a reasonable answer.
It's not pointless, it's so they can track you.
what a misnomer too
It's crazy how many people think "incognito mode" prevents people from seeing what websites they are visiting.
Any websites that doesn't just work with a simple ad blocker or still has ads I just close and never return.
It kind of makes sense for strawpoll, because without some sort of cookies, they wouldn't know if the same person is voting multiple times. But they should say something like 'incognito mode makes the votes inaccurate, please visit on normal mode'
One vote per IP-Address allowed.
They already have your IP. "Incognito" mode doesn't change that.
That does have the consequence of allowing only one person to vote per public IP, which on large networks may correspond to quite a lot of users.
That probably doesn't matter much for a simple internet straw poll, but I can imagine situations where IP-based uniqueness isn't reliable enough.
That doesn't work for dynamic IPs
I kind of understand this one though, 99% of the time stuff like this is just bullshit. But this is an effort to stop users from voting multiple times.
When I go to a site, and they do it, I avoid it at all the costs or never come back!
Sites like this I just close the tab and use uBlacklist to hide them from any search results.
Honestly people should just set there browser to clear cookies on close
Can't say I like logging into all of my accounts (most of which gave 2FA as well) 3 times a day
It would be nice if you could whitelist sites for cookies. That way you can stay logged into things like email.
You 100% can. That's exactly how I have mine set up. It clears cookies on exit but then I manage a whitelist.
Here are the Chrome instructions. Firefox is more or less the same.
Use the extension/add-on "cookie auto-delete" https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/cookie-autodelete/
It's magic!
And "I don't care about cookies" https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/i-dont-care-about-cookies/
This clears those annoying GPDR things.
These two add-ons will change your life.
They are available for all the browsers, not just Firefox.
You can, on firefox at least. No add ons required it's a browser feature.
I see that i directly close the thing
For such things, I have a script that creates a brand new temporary Firefox profile and deletes it immediately after closing the browser.
When is the world going to admit that by and large, internet advertising is garbage and doesn't work? People are far more likely to buy whatever random crap sponsor is on their fav youtuber's videos than anything from "targeted advertising".
Companies have the data for how much Internet advertising works.
That's why they keep buying ads.
Does it not work though?
It's hard to imagine that companies are just happily pissing away money on advertising for absolutely no reason. I agree that standard banner ads you see in articles seems pretty useless, but I can imagine other formats being more effective. Youtube ads, either as part of the content or interrupting it, seem decently effective, given that they're essentially the equivalent of TV ads. Speaking personally, I actually went to a cabaret-style show recently that I learned about through an Instagram ad, and had a really great time there. The performer asked how people had heard about it, and quite a lot were through Instagram.
And suffice it to say that, given that the title of this show is "Spooky and Gay", that ad was very much targeted lol, and effectively. I honestly can't say I'm that upset about it. I don't think it's so much the very concept of targeted advertising that I dislike so much as just the fact that it's so often done very poorly.
If it didn't work, do you really think "profit at all costs" businesses would be spending millions of dollars to do it?
It works often enough, and that amount is enough for Google and Facebook to become two of the largest companies in the world. If it didn't, people probably wouldn't have kept doing it this long. It may not work on you, but in that case you probably aren't representative of the general population.
This comment is brought to you by Raid: Shadow Legends! Use promo code "dangblingus" for gold or some shit. idk, I don't actually play it.
Unless it's a mobile game. Then miss me with that shit.
Because these sponsors are less often skipped. However, I am not sure they are very effective as many sponsors' products aren't even available in my country. For example, the last sponsor I saw was Factor75 selling food, and while I didn't check, I highly doubt they deliver to Europe. With normal ads, they are usually at least for products or services I can buy.
I guess geographically, YMMV.
Unless I'm really desperate for their content, that's when I kill the tab. The internet is vast, and I can probably find what I'm looking for elsewhere.
I use Linux and run my browsers sandboxxed with firejail. Install all the cookies you want, they are gone when the browser is closed.
I agree mildly infuriating "pointless cookies" really - they make their money from advertising and tracking data, so they've made a choice.
Interestingly, a choice that I'm pretty sure would fall foul of GDPR in Europe - but a choice.
You can install the Ghostery add-on on Firefox mobile to prevent cookies and trackers.
The website has the right to choose when you can use it unfortunately. If you don't like the decision, don't use it. Or you could just use a content blocker if the cookies are the issue.
It's not their business to know or dictate how to use my browser. It's like they were telling me I can only browse their site while wearing pink socks or something.