Google Chrome pushes browser history-based ad targeting • The Register

1984@lemmy.today to Technology@lemmy.ml – 247 points – Google Chrome pushes browser history-based ad targeting
theregister.com

Topics essentially works like this: rather than using cookies to track people around the web and figure out their interests from the sites they visit and the apps they use, websites can ask Chrome directly, via its Topics JavaScript API, what sort of things the user is interested in, and then display ads based on that. Chrome picks these topics of interest from studying the user's browser history.

Isn't this completely immoral? They are literally stealing the users private browsing history and uses it to boost their own profits.

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So what has to happen for the general population to move away from chrome/chromium?

Vivaldi had stripped out this crap, it's good that Chromium is FOSS, anybody can gut it to their like. Apart the Vivaldi History Page is way different from al other Chromium (Calendar view customizable in several formats, stadistics with graphs, not a simple list) since its first versions..

Vivaldi doesn’t collect your history data. All of this information is strictly private and local to your computer. What you get to see is the kind of data that could be tracked by third parties. Instead of trying to monetize it, we are giving you this data – for your eyes only. With the ability to analyze this information, you can decide if you want to adjust your online behavior or remove certain items from the list.

...and when browser integrity becomes a thing?

Wich browser integrity? Because of Chromium? Google already tried this years ago to try to control Chromiums with infinite APIs added to the Chromium code, even with discriminatory browsersniffings, which practically all other Chromium Browsers eliminated just as quickly, Vivaldi the first. Windows on Edge anyway (naturally putting its own Spy APIs in place of these). No trackings or logging by Google in Vivaldi (as long as you do not naturally use Google as a search engine). This is why Google is now trying to gain control through its web services and pages that use them with this WEI DRM, which forces all browsers, no matter what engine, be it Chromium, Firefox Gecko or Safari WebKit, to include a "security" Google Token in your script to access these pages or services. This is naturally a huge bummer if not avoided, since then it depends only on Google which browser deserves this Token, which could be the end of all minority browsers, leaving in the end only Chrome itself with full internet access. THAT is the problem, not the browser integrity.

Nothing. It's only the tin-foil hatters that care about privacy because the normal people have nothing to hide.

Post your entire browser history right now then.

Probably could, there's nothing interesting you'll find there but I'm not bothered enough.

Interesting. So they know what bank you use, which problems you have in your relationship, if your partner was ever unfaithful.

They can find out stuff about you that you don’t know yourself and use it to manipulate you (for example in pointing you away from anti trust legislation support, etc).

It’s not tinfoil hat at all. Google and co have been fined billions for doing this exact stuff.

Post your last 100 transactions?

Nah. Am good. You people can't read sarcasm or what ...

Sarcasm in person generally comes with a distinctive tone of voice, facial expressions, and body language that are lacking in text-only communication. If people know you well enough in a text chat, they can often make assumptions about your seriousness based on what they know of your beliefs, but we are on an anonymous message board here. The people here have no experience with whether or not you are naive or a jokester or seriously confused. There's a reason it became standard to mark sarcasm on reddit with /s, it is the simplest replacement for the missing tone and body language context that would go along with a statement if we were communicating face to face.

Sarcasm can also just be common sense but apparently humor isn't that common here.