There is no such thing as anonymous online tracking (article) + Q&A

http://cyberlaw.stanford.edu/node/6701

That link was found in the article Tracking the Trackers: Where Everybody Knows Your Username:

Q) How do sites decide what ads to show me?
A) See Your Online Attention, Bought in an Instant and The Disconcerting Details: How Facebook Teams Up With Data Brokers to Show You Targeted Ads.

Q) How do third parties get to see what I do on the web?
A) From How Online Tracking Companies Know Most of What You Do Online (and What Social Networks Are Doing to Help Them):

Q) Why should I care if my online activities haven't been linked to my real identity?
A) From Who are these tracking companies? Meet BlueKai:

Q) Can third parties with knowledge of my browsing habits learn my real identity?
A) From How Online Tracking Companies Know Most of What You Do Online (and What Social Networks Are Doing to Help Them):

Q) How can third parties with knowledge of my browsing habits learn my real identity?
A) See the previous link, and also the first link in this post.

Q) How much data do some data brokers have about me and how do they get it?
A) From Demanding transparency from data brokers:

Q) How many data brokers are out there?
A) This list contains 255 data brokers.

Q) In the USA, what data can employers legally get from data brokers?
A) See Cyber-Screening, Social Media, and Fair Credit Reporting: Why We Need to Move Beyond the FTC’s Recent Spokeo Enforcement Action.

Q) No data brokers ever violate the USA's Fair Credit Reporting Act, right?
A) From Find out (some of) what one big data broker knows about you:

 

A great post, thank you!

 

You're welcome!

 

Q) What online data might data brokers have about me?
A) From Meet the online snoops selling your dirty laundry and how you can stop them:

Q) What offline data might data brokers have about me?
A) From Meet the online snoops selling your dirty laundry and how you can stop them:

Q) Who buys data from data brokers?
A) From Meet the online snoops selling your dirty laundry and how you can stop them:

 

Q) Do some commerce sites vary prices depending on a user's browsing history?
A) Yes. From Websites Vary Prices, Deals Based on Users' Information:

Q) How common is the use of real identities on the Web?
A) From They Know What You're Shopping For:

 

Q) Where can I find more information about some of these online tracking companies?
A) See Who are these tracking companies? Meet BlueKai. (and follow links at the bottom there) and Top 100 websites: How they track your every move online.

Q) What Firefox privacy-related extensions should I use?
A) See How to build a Firefox privacy arsenal. I didn't post my complete list there yet because I'm still doing more research.

 

Q) Are any of the major data brokers trying to match your offline data to your online data?
A) Yes. See Financial Times: Acxiom to create ‘master profiles’ tying offline and online data.

 

i think this is some-what what i was interested in and knowing about this, so thanks for the posts.

the other concerns i was just thinking about though, is the fact that even behind vpns, whonix, tor, not associating with nor too your old usernames, old email addresses and etc etc.. Can "they" still know "who" you are by hardware signatures like your keyboard etc, mac address, dns addresses/dns, browser identities and such too?

Because if "they" can, then there's a lot more needed to be done to protect your privacy completely. It would be basically pointless to use VPNs, TOR, Whonix, and such if you're not preforming full "security" and "privacy" measures. For example, if keyboard/hardware signatures are given out, browser identities, dns addresses/dns, mac addresses and other things give you away... There's no point in firing up Whonix vm with tor and vpns.

Cause you would still be giving away all those other various "signatures" which links back to you anyway. You'd almost have to buy new keyboards, new mouse, new tower (built by OEM/local computer shop, or buy the parts yourself and build own computer), don't go online immediately... but instead copy/paste browser .exe to blank dvd disc, copy/paste whonix ova's, copy/paste whatever OS iso you want to use / run on "new tower".. to dvd discs ...

load up those things via disc drive on "new tower".. install those things, without being connected to internet on "new tower". change the mac address / dns addresses on primary main tower .. connect to internet on "new tower" that would have those modified mac address/dns addresses etc.

basically in short, "new tower", install all this stuff whilst being offline, change mac and dns addresses on main tower so before connected to net on "new tower" so those mac/dns addresses on "new tower" should be changed automatically.. so you're behind "modified" things before going online. So it helps make your "new tower" a "ghost machine" from ground up/get go.

 

You're welcome .

Browser fingerprinting is a possible concern. See https://panopticlick.eff.org/ to test your browser's fingerprint.

I'm not sure about the other concerns that you listed.

 

Thanks for this thread Mr Brian and your excellent posts, which I want to read carefully and go through the links when I can. So far Im still at the first post...

I think the whole "snooping on us" thing has the average jo bloggs at a serious disadvantage on many counts. In short, computers are technology based....the internet is technology based.... and most people dont have a clue about even the very basics of how to keep their computers safe, much less do it. To do so would entail not a cursory glance but many many hours of research and reading to even get an understanding of how this all works. After that... it's not called the WWW for nothing and eventually it will draw everyone into its net, as more and more of our private lives are forced to go online, eg smartmeters.

Meanwhile, I really liked the 2nd point from one of the comments from a link you supplied. It said:

...then someone aptly replied to the above comment...

 

spencerp, I hear what youre saying. I think when all is said and done, unless youre VERY VERY wised up all of security and privacy issues, there's going to be leaks. Not only will you need to be wised up, but STAY wised up. In other words you will need to be forever learning to keep abreast of the latest facts. Most people don't have that time. People will easily be suckered in to letting the M$'s and Googles take "good care" of their systems for them. Never have another worry, just let MS seamlessly update your system for you....yeah right.

 

You're welcome .

I can understand the "grand bargain" of getting services for free on the Web in exchange for targeted anonymous advertising, but the linking of your real identity (or your email address, etc.) with your online activities troubles me.

Those who have Firefox and want to see who's tracking you can try the Lightbeam extension.

 

Thanks for those links, will check it out!

And yeah, I'm not sure about other stuff. Except there are some things to change the dns address at modem/router directly.. and some mac address changers. But not sure how well they'll work though.

 

oh i agree totally.. it's never ending battle to stay on top of things and prevent "leaks" and etc. . It's sad actually, that you can't have any privacy at all. Almost like, ripping out the shower/tub from the house and put it in middle of Times Square in NYC and shower without a shower curtain around ya when showering. My as well do that sigh. >_<

 

Q) How do data brokers collect data, and how is this data used?
A) From Data brokers won’t even tell the government how it uses, sells your data:

 

If a person gets a free riseup account and never connects though his own router and then runs whonix through that, there is no way that it could be traced. If the person connects through a public wifi where no cameras are available and the VPN account has never connected to a personal router, then there's just no way. First, they would have to trace Tor's connection with Whonix to the VPN. That's probably not going to happen. But if it does then they would have to identify the owner of the VPN, and there is none. At best if they could identify the time and location they could try to get video. But if the person is not in view of video then that's not possible either. As for a MAC address, you could spoof that.

 

I forgot to also mention cookies. If you use Sandboxie and always delete your sandbox with each identity, then cookies will not persist.

 

haven't finished reading this yet but i would love if i was rich and it was possible to run adds that identified the current user. If this info is so accurate it would be epic to run adds that posted the users personal information in the add and explain it was gotten from metadata. I think that would be a power tool to inform people how scary this is. I would totally donate to a non-profit if that was their goal.

Is that possible to do?

 

Q) How can your digital trail be used against you?
A) See this four-part series:
http://www.npr.org/blogs/alltechcon...ital-trail-and-how-it-can-be-used-against-you
http://www.npr.org/blogs/alltechcon...072/your-digital-trail-private-company-access
http://www.npr.org/blogs/alltechcon...al-trail-does-the-fourth-amendment-protect-us
http://www.npr.org/blogs/alltechcon...-trail-data-fuels-political-and-legal-agendas

A condensed and edited version of above is available at http://cironline.org/reports/easily...rn-your-personal-information-against-you-5104.

 

Q) Have any TV shows covered the data broker industry?
A) Yes. A very informative 60 Minutes transcript is here.

 

Q) Is there a list of data brokers that I can get my info from, and a list of data brokers that I can opt out from?
A) Yes - see http://juliaangwin.com/privacy-tools-opting-out-from-data-brokers/.

 

So, do the NSA etc need to pay?

Or do they just have direct access?

 

Cookies that give you away: The surveillance implications of web tracking (paper)

 

Also see Opting Out from Data Brokers.