YSK: Social media platforms attach trackers to the end of share URLs (which you can and should delete)
Why YSK: Trackers don't do good for anyone except the platform, and they're not necessary to view the content in the URL.
It's courteous to not subject the recipient (most likely your friends and family) to this tracking. You're already sending them to the platform, which is tracking them in other ways. But you can help reduce that tracking by removing everything after the ampersand in the URL. Here are some examples.
Twitter example
URL: https://x.com/CookieSlayers/status/1623712884902567937?s=20
The s=20 is a Twitter-specific parameter to show that the tweet was copied from the web app. s=46 is iOS, and I can't remember what Android's code is. This is a relatively clean link, but there are some links that'll concatenate unique identifiers, like: https://x.com/CookieSlayers/status/1623712884902567937?s=20&t=Fn47fnSDJUD74bd9.
In this case, you'll notice there's also a &t= parameter, which is a unique identifier to the person who shared it.
The only part of the URL you need is https://x.com/CookieSlayers/status/1623712884902567937.
Instagram example:
URL: https://www.instagram.com/reel/CzP877du2EB/?igshid=MzRlODCFWFlZA==
The only part of the URL you need is https://www.instagram.com/reel/CzP877du2EB.
TikTok example
You'll notice TikTok's is a lot more readable in terms of what the URL contains.
The is_from_webapp parameter is self-explanatory, as is the sender_device, and then there's the identifier that's unique to you. In this case, 7302915057791436331.
The only part of the URL you need is https://www.tiktok.com/@inthepaintcrew/video/7301348328602717482.
The best route^1^ would be to use privacy-respecting frontends, but if you don't, simply deleting everything after the ampersand goes a long way.
^1^The best route would actually be to not use/reward platforms that are literally destroying humanity, but we're not there yet, so... in the meantime, let's just try to decrease the tracking and stop subjecting our friends and family to it as much as possible.
I use this installable web app for cleaning extra parameters from links - https://linkcleaner.app/
Adds a share target to Android once you install it as well, makes it easy to send links to. Open source too!
That sounds useful. Although I always fix them, I do get tired of squinting at urls looking for the &.
Anyone have an Android version of this?
I found URLCheck recently. It's great!
I downloaded it, but how does it work setting it as your default browser? Doesn't that prevent links from opening in your browser of choice? (in my case, Fennec)
You set URLCheck as your default browser, then you can select an actual default web browser in the app.
Or don't change your default browser at all and selectively share to URLCheck when you need.
I dislike that Android makes it so easy to accidentally set an app as default for something, and the only way to reverse it is to revoke all of the app's defaults
You can (at least on my my phone) separately configure the default browser.
Oh, I see. Thanks. I'll re-install it so I can try it. I panicked when it asked me to set it as my default browser.
I use https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.svenjacobs.app.leon
Hmmm. I see a ? In that link ... Tracking me much??
Jk thanks though
Downloaded btw thanks again
It's an installable PWA, click the ... Menu in Chrome browser and choose "install". Hope this helps!