<story><title>Google faces $5B lawsuit for tracking people in incognito mode</title><url>https://www.cnet.com/news/google-faces-5-billion-lawsuit-for-tracking-people-in-incognito-mode/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>pacala</author><text>Does Google Chrome set DoNotTrack by default in incognito mode? If not, why not?</text></item><item><author>stiray</author><text>They dont need to invent their own header. They just need to obey existing ones: &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Do_Not_Track&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Do_Not_Track&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;I would expect that no script would be loaded from google analytics&amp;#x2F;tag manager domains once I turn it on. But this is obviously not the case.&lt;p&gt;The article is too vague to actually understand more about what this lawsuit is but regarding:&lt;p&gt;&lt;i&gt;Google tracks and collects consumer browsing history and other web activity data no matter what safeguards consumers undertake to protect their data privacy,&amp;quot; reads the complaint. The search giant surreptitiously collects data through Google Analytics, Google Ad Manager, website plug-ins and other applications, including mobile apps, according to the complaint.&lt;/i&gt;&lt;p&gt;They are right. Google is doing that.&lt;p&gt;I think that incognito mode was mentioned due to this statement: &lt;i&gt;safeguards consumers undertake to protect their data privacy&lt;/i&gt;.&lt;p&gt;They will probably build the case that they tried to protect themselfs but google was still tracking them.&lt;p&gt;And if chrome is sending to google servers flag that user has turned on incognito mode (which I bet they are&amp;#x2F;did), then they are having a serious problem.&lt;p&gt;&amp;quot;Poor user, this little girl with cute blue eyes, tried to protect itself from invasion of her privacy, they knew that but were still tracking her&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;If this is the case they will have to pay or bribe the judge.&lt;p&gt;The law firm that is behind it is specialized into class action lawsuits with crew of around 300 lawyers so I expect a good show. I hope google wont settle outside the court.</text></item><item><author>jedieaston</author><text>It&amp;#x27;d be impossible for Google Analytics to not collect data from a incognito tab without it knowing that it is incognito somehow (like if Chrome attached a header to all outgoing requests that said incognito=1 or something). But then websites would know you are in incognito, and find some other way to track you without leaving cookies on your box (like logging the IP address for the request and merging all incognito requests into one profile, which would be accurate enough).&lt;p&gt;What do they want Google to do? They warn you specifically of this anyway when you open an incognito tab:&lt;p&gt;&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;You&amp;#x27;ve gone incognito&lt;p&gt;Now you can browse privately, and other people who use this device won&amp;#x27;t see your activity. However, downloads and bookmarks will be saved. Learn more...&lt;p&gt;Chrome won&amp;#x27;t save the following information:&lt;p&gt;Your browsing history&lt;p&gt;Cookies and site data&lt;p&gt;Information entered in forms&lt;p&gt;Your activity might still be visible to:&lt;p&gt;Websites you visit&lt;p&gt;Your employer or school&lt;p&gt;Your internet service provider&lt;p&gt;&amp;quot;</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>_-david-_</author><text>I am not a Google employee but Chrome does not send the dnt header in incognito mode. It only sends it when you have it turned on, in which case it will send it in both regular and incognito mode.</text></comment>
<story><title>Google faces $5B lawsuit for tracking people in incognito mode</title><url>https://www.cnet.com/news/google-faces-5-billion-lawsuit-for-tracking-people-in-incognito-mode/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>pacala</author><text>Does Google Chrome set DoNotTrack by default in incognito mode? If not, why not?</text></item><item><author>stiray</author><text>They dont need to invent their own header. They just need to obey existing ones: &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Do_Not_Track&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Do_Not_Track&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;I would expect that no script would be loaded from google analytics&amp;#x2F;tag manager domains once I turn it on. But this is obviously not the case.&lt;p&gt;The article is too vague to actually understand more about what this lawsuit is but regarding:&lt;p&gt;&lt;i&gt;Google tracks and collects consumer browsing history and other web activity data no matter what safeguards consumers undertake to protect their data privacy,&amp;quot; reads the complaint. The search giant surreptitiously collects data through Google Analytics, Google Ad Manager, website plug-ins and other applications, including mobile apps, according to the complaint.&lt;/i&gt;&lt;p&gt;They are right. Google is doing that.&lt;p&gt;I think that incognito mode was mentioned due to this statement: &lt;i&gt;safeguards consumers undertake to protect their data privacy&lt;/i&gt;.&lt;p&gt;They will probably build the case that they tried to protect themselfs but google was still tracking them.&lt;p&gt;And if chrome is sending to google servers flag that user has turned on incognito mode (which I bet they are&amp;#x2F;did), then they are having a serious problem.&lt;p&gt;&amp;quot;Poor user, this little girl with cute blue eyes, tried to protect itself from invasion of her privacy, they knew that but were still tracking her&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;If this is the case they will have to pay or bribe the judge.&lt;p&gt;The law firm that is behind it is specialized into class action lawsuits with crew of around 300 lawyers so I expect a good show. I hope google wont settle outside the court.</text></item><item><author>jedieaston</author><text>It&amp;#x27;d be impossible for Google Analytics to not collect data from a incognito tab without it knowing that it is incognito somehow (like if Chrome attached a header to all outgoing requests that said incognito=1 or something). But then websites would know you are in incognito, and find some other way to track you without leaving cookies on your box (like logging the IP address for the request and merging all incognito requests into one profile, which would be accurate enough).&lt;p&gt;What do they want Google to do? They warn you specifically of this anyway when you open an incognito tab:&lt;p&gt;&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;You&amp;#x27;ve gone incognito&lt;p&gt;Now you can browse privately, and other people who use this device won&amp;#x27;t see your activity. However, downloads and bookmarks will be saved. Learn more...&lt;p&gt;Chrome won&amp;#x27;t save the following information:&lt;p&gt;Your browsing history&lt;p&gt;Cookies and site data&lt;p&gt;Information entered in forms&lt;p&gt;Your activity might still be visible to:&lt;p&gt;Websites you visit&lt;p&gt;Your employer or school&lt;p&gt;Your internet service provider&lt;p&gt;&amp;quot;</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>pmiller2</author><text>I&amp;#x27;m not sure if they do, but one potential reason not to do it is that setting DNT literally gives the server 1 additional bit of information about your configuration.  This could be used to track you more effectively.</text></comment>