Anonymizing Google's Cookie

[Kye-U]

http://www.imilly.com/google-cookie.htm

Quote:If you use Google, and you accept it's cookie, you should give some thought to the implications, both good and potentially bad : this page tries to help you do that, together with an easy way to anonymize it without missing out on its benefits.

First the good. It's useful to you. It's how Google saves your preferences (such as language, filtering, number of results per page, etc). If, like me, you want fifty results per page (not just ten), in English only (not in languages I can't read), unfiltered for adult content (I'm not a child), then you need the Google cookie.

Now the potentially bad. You use Google a lot, right? If someone was peering over your shoulder, watching every Google search you made; making a note of what you looked for; what you found; and sometimes where you visited from the results; (and maybe every email you sent and received); and did so for years and years: they'd grow to know quite a bit about you, eh? Well, that's what the cookie allows Google to do, forever, if you don't take simple precautions. You can read more on all that below, if you like.

[cool]

Soo.. if we dont accept the cookie, they cant track where u went? they still log i.p addresses i assume.

[Oddysey]

cool;

Yes, they do log those IP's, of course. But while they can log a referrer IP when you come in, it's a lot harder for them to log a destination IP when you leave to visit another site. It's when you come back that they'll get that info, once again in the referrer field.

Unless you make the job easier for them by leaving the cookie enabled and un-anonymized.


Oddysey

[hpguru]

Oddysey Wrote:Yes, they do log those IP's, of course. But while they can log a referrer IP when you come in, it's a lot harder for them to log a destination IP when you leave to visit another site.

That is incorrect. They also log the links you click on the search results pages.

Oddysey Wrote:It's when you come back that they'll get that info, once again in the referrer field.

That is also is incorrect. A referer would only be transmitted if you clicked a link to google.com on the page.