Submission timeline
2007–2026One slot for every year since HN launched. Height is that year's peak points; orange marks a 100+ point or 50+ comment breakout. Select a bar to open its strongest thread.
First comments on top threads
HN comment orderInteresting counterpoint to people who claim that turning off Javascript is just another data point. I use Firefox with a decent amount of tracking protection turned on. With Javascript, I leak about 16 bits of identifying information. Without, I leak about 7. You want to take that with a grain of salt, because I don't think Panopticlick is a perfect tool to measure this stuff. For one thing, I suspect that Panopticlick is highly influenced by the people who visit…
Impressive idea for fingerprinting a user, especially along the font/plugin vector. Looking at just Java plugins, and the number of releases, you could also in theory age a browser, on how long it's been operational on how far back in versions of a plugin the browser maintains.
The test over at http://ip-check.info, by JonDo, is more comprehensive at the expense of not using information theoretical measures like those of Panopticlick, which would give a realistic (if biased) view of browser fingerprint uniqueness. They’ve developed a Firefox setup profile called JonDoBrowser that’s optimized for their own test. While the HTTP headers JonDoBrowser sends to sites can be easily distinguished from those of other browsers (though they’ve attempted to standardize HTTP headers within their own…
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10753087
The first top-level comment from each of the four biggest threads, in HN’s own order. Excerpts are shortened; open a comment for full context.
- Breakout years
- 2
- Total points
- 823
- Total comments
- 377
100+ points or 50+ comments
reference only — not used in Hall rules or ranking
reference only — not used in Hall rules or ranking