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Playing Around With Tracking Protection In IE9

Roberto123 writes "I have tried out the Tracking Protection feature in the coming Internet Explorer 9 browser from Microsoft. While the feature does effectively block ads from Web sites, I'm not yet convinced that giving the users the options to select content to 'Block' or 'Allow' will be that effective."

13 of 138 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Call Centre Tech Support... by westlake · · Score: 3, Informative

    no doubt the button to reset this feature to defaults (and remove any blacklisting) will be hidden seven layers deep in complex "Options" dialogs

    Tools>Safety>Tracking Protection>Disable

  2. Re:Better than not having it by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I would say that most people think of a Computer with Internet the same as Television.
    If I just watch content then how could I get a virus? I was just watching!
    I have to agree with them at the most fundamental level.

  3. Re:bing! by high_rolla · · Score: 5, Funny

    Bing doesn't need a backdoor. Its probably easier for them to just Google you to find out about you.

    --
    Ryans Tutorials - A collection of technology tutorials.
  4. Re:Better than not having it by causality · · Score: 3

    I would say that most people think of a Computer with Internet the same as Television.
    If I just watch content then how could I get a virus? I was just watching!
    I have to agree with them at the most fundamental level.

    The difference is that television is one-to-many communication and fundamentally one-way.

    The Internet is many-to-many communication and fundamentally two-way.

    The people who fail to recognize the difference and the implications of that difference are simply wrong. Fundamentally wrong, if you like. The fact that assuming security doesn't matter is a sure way to get 0wned is a very strong argument against them. I am all for advocating what someone believes is an ideal expectation, but not when it contradicts the manifest reality. Then it's just ignorance. Ignorance is not and has never been a solid foundation for good decision-making.

    --
    It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education. - Einstein
  5. Re:Who cares? by santax · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Let me get this straight. It's my fault if someone kills me in my home. I should have cared better about security? It's not the consumers fault for believing when they buy a pc with legal software they have everything they need. When I buy a new car, I'm not going to take it to a garage to check the brakes, you just assume it works. Not everybody knows a thing or 2 about software/hardware. No matter how you turn it. It's still the baddies fault.

  6. Could this be the nuclear option against Google? by Dr.+Spork · · Score: 4, Interesting

    If Microsoft suddenly get good ad blocking - as in, really good ad blocking, they could completely cut off all oxygen from Google. Of course, MS also makes some money from web advertising, but they don't need it to live like Google does. Also, it really would improve the quality of the user experience in IE if this were done well and thoroughly.

  7. Re:Who cares? by DeathFromSomewhere · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I do, because Firefox has slowly turned into a bloated pile of ass. Ironically, it's now more bloated and slower then IE9. This isn't 2004 anymore and we aren't talking about IE6.

    --
    -1 overrated isn't the same thing as "I disagree".
  8. Re:Who cares? by ThatsMyNick · · Score: 3, Interesting

    You should care, because if ad block becomes defacto and comes preinstalled with IE9, ad agencies would quickly start workaround it (just like how hulu does currently (hulu's policy is, you can use adblock, but you would have to putup with a min of absolute silence and blank screen before the show continues))

  9. Chestnuts by symbolset · · Score: 3, Interesting
    Derived from an old chestnut.

    Your post advocates a

    (X) technical ( ) legislative ( ) market-based ( ) vigilante

    approach to fighting Internet Tracking. Your idea will not work. Here is why it won't work. (One or more of the following may apply to your particular idea, and it may have other flaws which used to vary from state to state before a bad federal law was passed.)

    (X) Trackers can easily use it to identify those they want to track the most
    (X) User preferences and other legitimate tracking uses would be affected
    (X) No one will be able to find the guy or collect the money
    ( ) It is defenseless against brute force attacks
    ( ) It will stop tracking for two weeks and then we'll be stuck with it
    ( ) Users of the Web will not put up with it
    ( ) Microsoft will not put up with it
    ( ) The police will not put up with it
    (X) Requires too much cooperation from trackers
    (X) Requires immediate total cooperation from everybody at once
    (X) Many Web users cannot afford to lose business or alienate potential employers
    (X) Trackers don't care about invalid addresses in their lists
    ( ) Anyone could anonymously destroy anyone else's career or business

    Specifically, your plan fails to account for

    ( ) Laws expressly prohibiting it
    (X) Lack of centrally controlling authority for web tracking
    ( ) Open relays in foreign countries
    ( ) Ease of searching tiny alphanumeric address space of all IP addresses
    (X) Asshats
    (X) Jurisdictional problems
    ( ) Unpopularity of weird new taxes
    ( ) Public reluctance to accept weird new forms of money
    (X) Huge existing software investment in shopping carts
    (X) Susceptibility of protocols other than HTTP to attack
    (X) Willingness of users to install browser plugins
    (X) Armies of worm riddled broadband-connected Windows boxes
    (X) Eternal arms race involved in all filtering approaches
    (X) Extreme profitability of web tracking
    ( ) Joe jobs and/or identity theft
    (X) Technically illiterate politicians
    (X) Extreme stupidity on the part of people who do business with affiliate programs
    (X) Dishonesty on the part of trackers themselves
    ( ) Bandwidth costs that are unaffected by client filtering
    ( ) IE

    and the following philosophical objections may also apply:

    (X) Ideas similar to yours are easy to come up with, yet none have ever
    been shown practical
    (X) Any scheme based on opt-out is unacceptable
    (X) HTML headers should not be the subject of legislation
    (X) Blacklists suck
    ( ) Whitelists suck
    ( ) We should be able to talk about Viagra without being censored
    ( ) Countermeasures should not involve wire fraud or credit card fraud
    ( ) Countermeasures should not involve sabotage of public networks
    ( ) Countermeasures must work if phased in gradually
    ( ) Browsing should be free
    (X) Why should we have to trust you and your servers?
    ( ) Incompatiblity with open source or open source licenses
    (X) Feel-good measures do nothing to solve the problem
    ( ) Temporary/one-time IP addresses are cumbersome
    (X) I don't want the government reading my tracking preferences
    (X) Killing them that way is not slow and painful enough

    Furthermore, this is what I think about you:

    (X) Sorry dude, but I don't think it would work.
    ( ) This is a stupid idea, and you're a stupid person for suggesting it.
    ( ) Nice try, assh0le! I'm going to find out where you live and burn your
    house down!

    --
    Help stamp out iliturcy.
  10. Re:Same can be said for Facebook. by igb · · Score: 3, Insightful
    Actually, it wouldn't. You can normally write a computer program to mimic any human interaction within a browser. There are exceptions, but if content-providers were to move to (say) captchas in adverts prior to serving content, they would be writing their own death warrant: even if they didn't get killed by related providers who didn't impose this load, the simple (im) practicalities and (un) reliability of captchas would mean that far fewer people would read the page, unless it was utterly indispensable.

    Ad-supported models are inherently brittle. They rely on advertisers being willing to purchase space, because they believe it to be worth their while. If consumers are unwilling to watch (and, indeed, act on) adverts, the magic money tree suddenly goes bare. No amount of howling that people who skip adverts are "stealing" content will put the fruit back on it. In the UK --- I don't know enough about the US --- the PVR has essentially killed one of the advertising-supported channels (ITV) to the point that its target demographic is now variously the old, poor and stupid who cannot manage a PVR. The smaller advertising-supported channels (ITV2/3/4, say) contain nothing but debt consolidation and personal injury shark adverts, and no-one with a post-16 education would find anything they might want to buy, even if they watched the adverts, which they don't. Unable to see their model is in a death spiral, the owners chase to the bottom, with programming aimed at the diminishing pool of viewers who are prepared to watch. The same is happening with Channel 5, while Channel 4 (which isn't directly ad-supported, but is indirectly ad-supported because as well as its own, small, advertising sales it is funded by a levy on ITV) has seen the writing on the wall and is desperately seeking funding as a top-slice on the BBC license income.

    TV is progressively going subscription. Yes, some of the subscription channels also show adverts, but that's gravy, in the manner of adverts in cinemas, and they could live without it by just raising their subscriptions. It's only a matter of time before "free", advertising-supported, web content goes the same way. How are AOL these days?

  11. Re:Tired of MS by ClubStew · · Score: 3, Informative

    Have you even looked at the list of providers? They are third-party sites, like eTrust that has been around for ages.

  12. Re:No ads benefits folks you may not like by CAIMLAS · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I had to read your post twice, because it made absolutely no sense to me. Then, I realized I understood you - I still don't think it makes sense.

    No ads = less diverse content.

    When I think of "sites with ads" I think of: sites like cracked.com, link aggregators, and facebook - sites with no content of value

    There will be unintended consequences. If one person blocks ads then they're just a free-rider. If everyone does, the web will really suck.

    Unsubstantiated claim. On what basis do you make it? The absence of twitter, facebook and the like is hardly a game-stopper.

    Sure, some sweet folks will continue to post hobby sites, just as in the golden days of yore. And non-profits will publish. And big corporate sales and propaganda sites. And the Government and lobbyists. (BTW: They're all selling you something, aren't they?) But most of what makes the web diverse and useful and free today will die if advertising is eliminated.

    Wait - I'm completely lost by these statements. Aren't these "will still be around" sites the actual content on the Internet - the stuff that brought us all here in the first place? By your Slashdot UUID it would seem you're likely old enough to remember the days of dialup and maybe even BBSes; surely "the web" isn't more functionally useful now to you than it was back then? Honestly: it was easier to find stuff back then because there was a lot less noise (at least now that google has insisted on making their search engine less functional than astavista).

    There will still be sites like Debka and WND, which get most of their revenue through syndication and memberships - if that's what you'd miss. CNN, Fox News and the like would likely be cut down to size if the syndicated adverts were all gone, as well. Wikipedia, by far the most useful "modern" web source? No ads to speak of, so 'blocking' them isn't a matter.

    But even if that happens, getting rid of "all ads" is unlikely to happen. Honestly: I hope it doesn't happen.

    Let me explain. I'm really adverse to ads. They bother me on a 'ok, now my eyes are twitching and i need a cigarette' level. However, within specific contexts, I appreciate them. For instance, I went to the trouble of disabling ad blocking on a couple sites I frequent because:

    1) the sites were small: either community or proprietor run, with strong communities
    2) the ads were communally targeted (ie for the group/community interests)
    3) the ads were specifically picked/allowed by the site proprietors/owners/managers
    4) the ads weren't intrusive or excessive

    If advertisers hadn't decided to nuke users from orbit for short-term monetary gain, the popularity (and capability) of ad blocking software would've never come to be. They dug their own grave: they're providing nothing useful to their customers at this point, and need to re-think their business. (This goes for Google as well. Their ad noise is worse now than AltaVista was when I decided to stop using them.)

    --
    ~/ssh slashdot.org ssh: connect to host slashdot.org port 22: too many beers
  13. Re:Tired of MS by Nerull · · Score: 4, Funny

    Don't bring facts into this.