The Myth of Browser Based "Do Not Track"

It turns out a lot of browsers have been including privacy options lately as part of their feature offerings. But a new article written by Robert McGarvey claims these browser based methods don't really protect the end-user's privacy.

The explanation from his article:

The problem -- and it is huge -- is that we suddenly are in a lather about Websites tracking our movement on the Internet, with the result that we get barraged with targeted advertisements. Look at a travel site about Barbados, and for the next week likely you will be served ads offering deals and discounts in Barbados.

Now, by late January, the major browser developers have announced tools to help users prevent being tracked. The Internet Explorer tool is built into IE 9. Google’s tool for Chrome is here. Mozilla discusses its Firefox initiative here.

The problem with these new privacy tools is they require the participation of the advertiser to work. If the advertiser respects your settings, you're all good, but if they choose not to respect them, you're still being tracked. How many of us trust the advertisers to actually trust settings in a web browser?

Accordingly McGarvey does offer one solution:

The only way not to be tracked may be the use of proxy sites. “Proxies truly work,” says Hayes. Surf through a third-party detour and, suddenly, all the Internet ad surfers are baffled by your identity.

Downside: Most proxies produce a very slow Internet experience, which is why they haven’t caught on.

But note that until we start surfing with proxies we almost certainly will be tracked; that just is reality. “People have very little right to their own privacy online,” says Hayes. “It’s scary.”

Of course what McGarvey means when he says to use proxy sites, is of course anonymous proxy sites as we've discussed on this site in the past. Anonymous proxies have their upside and their downsides as well. One of the big downsides is of course the ability to allow end-users to bypass the security settings on an organization's web proxy, and letting the end-user surf to sites that might be considered banned by the organization. Which makes me think there's a market for web proxies to include an anonymous proxy in their secure web gateway.