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People tracking me on the web

by Nate D
12 replies
So I've always heard that big companies track their visitors web surfing activities - in order to know what they are interested in. I never cared, or thought much about this....But then recently when people ask me to visit their websites - I notice that I am getting some strange questions. How common is it for just regular websites to track their visitors surfing activities?
#people #tracking #web
  • Profile picture of the author rensta
    Banned
    [DELETED]
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    • Profile picture of the author JimMichael
      I sense paranoia...
      Signature

      .

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  • Profile picture of the author sshusain
    it's very weird.
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  • Profile picture of the author protectyoursales
    Well, technically speaking just about every website these days will try to throw in a tracking cookie of some kind during your browsing experience. If a site runs Google Adsense, they're tracking you. If you're on Facebook, you're being tracked. If you click on an affiliate link, you're being tracked.

    I guess it depends on to what extent you're asking about?
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  • Profile picture of the author davejug1
    Any company interested in sales wants to know the visitor demographics. It's good (and free) market research for them.

    I do it myself in the way of forms, polls, simple yes/no answers onsite, feedback sections.

    To sell to them, you have to know them.

    Often though, the questions you are answering are not theirs, they are getting paid by someone else for leads.
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  • Profile picture of the author MichaelSJohn
    Welcome to the modern world, if you want to be online expect no privacy.
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    • Profile picture of the author Karen Blundell
      there are settings on your browser that you can adjust to allow yourself a bit more privacy while browsing the web. You can turn off all cookies, for example. Firefox has an option under "tools" that allows for Private Browsing.
      Using this option means you won't be saving files to your cache, etc.
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  • Profile picture of the author Aniket
    New firefox version has DO NOT TRACK option. You can use it to maintain privacy
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    • Profile picture of the author Nate D
      Originally Posted by Aniket View Post

      New firefox version has DO NOT TRACK option. You can use it to maintain privacy
      Thanks. Yesterday I signed up for something called Do Not Track Plus...I followed the directions for the firefox do not track option. After just one half hour of surfing it caught over 150 tracking programs.
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      • Profile picture of the author Randall Magwood
        Originally Posted by Nate D View Post

        Thanks. Yesterday I signed up for something called Do Not Track Plus...I followed the directions for the firefox do not track option. After just one half hour of surfing it caught over 150 tracking programs.
        Do Not Track Plus... i gotta check this out. Thanks for sharing. Are the tracking programs spyware?
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  • Profile picture of the author Nate D

    I just followed the directions from this link.
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    • Profile picture of the author Rembro
      stayinvisible.com - a kind of eye opener
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  • Profile picture of the author Jonathan Joseph
    Hi Nate,

    It's very common apparently. I was even watching a program on TV the other day about Google tracking what people type in the search bar then attach it to their IP, and file it. I don't know if they do that anymore since the whole privacy update. However it's been done.
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    Jon

    "Success comes when people act together; failure tends to happen alone." -- Deepak Chopra

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