I wish more people clean URLs before sharing it to others. - Lemmy
lemmy.ml
I see a lot of people, including friends and family, sharing URLs rife with tracking parameters. I feel alone in making sure that I’m sharing the cleanest possible URLs to others. For example, checking if the URLs are shortened to hide plenty of tracking params. Just need to vent, thanks for reading. Edit: adding some context for future references. By using url tracking params, tech companies can track who shares the content and who clicks on that specific shared urls. A simple but effective tracking method. Try sharing Instagram post or YouTube video from the apps. Instagram adds ‘igshid=’ . YouTube adds ‘si=’. If you share the same IG or YouTube content from different accounts. The ‘igshid’, ‘si’ value will be different. This can be used to tag who shares it, and who clicks on that specific url param value. TikTok hides a ton of such params behind shortened url. Try expanding tiktok shared urls. If you use android, use this app to expand, analyze and clean up urls https://github.com/TrianguloY/UrlChecker [https://github.com/TrianguloY/UrlChecker] If you use Firefox (you should), install ublock origin and add this url tracking filter maintained by adguard: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/AdguardTeam/FiltersRegistry/master/filters/filter_17_TrackParam/filter.txt [https://raw.githubusercontent.com/AdguardTeam/FiltersRegistry/master/filters/filter_17_TrackParam/filter.txt]

I see a lot of people, including friends and family, sharing URLs rife with tracking parameters.

I feel alone in making sure that I’m sharing the cleanest possible URLs to others. For example, checking if the URLs are shortened to hide plenty of tracking params.

Just need to vent, thanks for reading.

Edit: adding some context for future references.

By using url tracking params, tech companies can track who shares the content and who clicks on that specific shared urls. A simple but effective tracking method.

Try sharing Instagram post or YouTube video from the apps.

Instagram adds ‘igshid=’ . YouTube adds ‘si=’.

If you share the same IG or YouTube content from different accounts. The ‘igshid’, ‘si’ value will be different.

This can be used to tag who shares it, and who clicks on that specific url param value.

TikTok hides a ton of such params behind shortened url. Try expanding tiktok shared urls.

If you use android, use this app to expand, analyze and clean up urls https://github.com/TrianguloY/UrlChecker

If you use Firefox (you should), install ublock origin and add this url tracking filter maintained by adguard: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/AdguardTeam/FiltersRegistry/master/filters/filter_17_TrackParam/filter.txt

        • originalfrozenbanana@lemm.ee
          1·
          3 years ago

          This may work for sharing links to static content, but it is terrible advice for anything interactive. That removes all URL params and will break lots of interactive sites.

          • WarmSoda@lemm.ee
            1·
            3 years ago

            What would be considered interactive vs static? How would I explain that to someone, for example?

            • originalfrozenbanana@lemm.ee
              1·
              3 years ago

              Most things you share will be static. These are things like news articles and webcomics where the output of the page is always the same no matter what you do. Things like google searches or YouTube links that are different depending on some way you interact with the site are dynamic. If you search for “apples” in google you’ll get different results than if you search for “oranges.” If you share the apple search with someone, your apple text will be coded as a parameter after the ?. If you strip that off they’d go to google.com and not see any apples. Trackers and other surveillance tools are also captured in the query params so for dynamic content it can be tricky to know which params to remove and which to keep. For static content you can just remove them all because the content doesn’t change based on the params you pass it

        • CoderKat@lemm.ee
          2·
          3 years ago

          There’s a lot of common patterns, but you have to understand how URLs work. You have to recognize which URL parameters are tracking ones or even just might be tracking. And that means you have to know how they work and that takes a moment.

          In brief, URL parameters start after a ? in the URL and are formatted like key1=values&key2=value2. You can’t usually remove all parameters because not all are tracking. To further complicate things, URLs can also have an anchor starting with a # character which will be after the URL parameters. You often don’t want to remove that (though theoretically the anchor could in fact contain tracking details).

          It’s often trial and error to see which parameters you can remove. I do this a lot since I write a lot of technical documentation. Clean URLs make the documentation more compact and less likely to break. It’s not just tracking stuff, but sometimes you need to remove temporal data that makes a page display data from a specific time when you want it to just default to the current time (etc).

        • AeroLemming@lemm.ee
          1·
          3 years ago

          I mean, you can just install ClearURLs on Firefox for both desktop and Android and it will cover 99% of cases completely automatically without any technical knowledge.

        • WarmSoda@lemm.ee
          2·
          3 years ago

          You don’t think anyone is here to learn how to be more private on the Internet? You just expect everyone to already know everything

          • narwhal@lemmy.mlOP
            1·
            3 years ago

            Look, the point is that I’ve tried explaining it to friends and family and whoever want (and don’t want) to listen.

            This post is a rant / wishful thinking as stated as being so, I’m not in the mood of explaining everything again. I’ve done that in my personal blog, etc.

          • narwhal@lemmy.mlOP
            1·
            3 years ago

            No but that’s what the comments are for. I share if the discussion is relevant.

            • Chunk@lemmy.world
              1·
              3 years ago

              Don’t worry mate. I’ve never heard the term but I knew exactly what you meant. I cleaned a url earlier today for Lemmy.

      • AlexWIWA@lemmy.ml
        11·
        3 years ago

        On YouTube links, delete anything after the ?

        Someone post the next website

    • mo_ztt ✅@lemmy.world
      1·
      3 years ago

      I had someone watch me edit a URL in the address bar and she clearly thought I was just fucking around, because there was no possible way that any human could edit the Matrix language up there and accomplish anything productive.

      • WarmSoda@lemm.ee
        1·
        3 years ago

        That’s part of my point. Most people just don’t know.
        That’s like telling someone to just tune their carburator.

        • Butt Pirate@reddthat.com
          3·
          3 years ago

          I mean carburetor tuning is a must-have skill for absolutely anyone who has one. Otherwise you can never be sure that you are getting an ideal fuel-air mixture, and the ratio changes over time with the temperature, humidity, seasons, etc. Really, it’s irresponsible to not know how to do this if you have a car with a carburetor.

          • Damage@slrpnk.net
            1·
            3 years ago

            Brake line bleeding is a must-have skill for anyone with brakes. Otherwise you can never be sure not to have air in the brake lines. Really it’s irresponsible not to know how to do this if you have a vehicle with idraulic brakes.

            • psud@lemmy.world
              1·
              3 years ago

              Or you can get your mechanic to do it. It’s not like brakes get air bubbles during normal operation, it’s only a risk when working on the brakes in any other way

              (Was your comment a poke at the previous one, pointing out that one doesn’t really need those skills? If so I think it’s reasonable for a person with a carburettor vehicle to learn how to tune it, as the skills are becoming rare)

              • _cnt0@unilem.org
                1·
                3 years ago

                Being able to adjust your sarcasm detector is a must-have skill. Sarcasm levels fluctuate wildly depending on platform, community, season, and topic. Otherwise you can never know if you’re making an ass of yourself when replying to other comments. Really, it’s irresponsible to partake in social media without a finely tuned sarcasm detector.

                • psud@lemmy.world
                  1·
                  3 years ago

                  I take it you missed my bracketed comment acknowledging it was probably sarcastic.

        • pixelscript@lemmy.ml
          1·
          3 years ago

          inb4 you get an indignant reply suggesting that carburetor tuning is a must-have skill for absolutely anyone who owns anything that has one

  • Oliver Lowe@lemmy.sdf.org
    4·
    3 years ago

    Thankfully uBlock Origin removes those parameters for us. The default filters include a whole bunch of removeparam filters; e.g. privacy.txt See also removeparam.

    Maybe you could help your friends and family install Firefox and/or uBlock Origin? Every little bit helps :)

  • Zerush@lemmy.ml
    2·
    3 years ago

    I shall do it, because i hate this URL ads, even more the fucking link shortener, because they disguised it and avoid to see the destination. Because of this i use 2 extension, a Link unshortener, which reveal the real URL, when i click on a shorten link also the Adguardfilter in the Vivaldi’s own trackerblocker, You can find more filters here:

    https://filterlists.com

  • Kushan@lemmy.world
    1·
    3 years ago

    I do this because I hate super long URL’s, but is this actually a problem for privacy? Does it not actually fuck with the tracking because now two separate people have got the same tracking Params? (Genuine question).

    • DrM@feddit.de
      1·
      3 years ago

      Nope. It’s a nightmare. The ad company now knows that you are friends or family

        • narwhal@lemmy.mlOP
          1·
          3 years ago

          Then they know who’s the poster (you), they can know your username if they want to. A lot of people use the same username in many places, so unless you use different usernames in different social media, it’s still valuable data.

          If not that, seeing how the content spreads through social media and analyzing the reach is interesting data by itself.

          • SnowdenHeroOfOurTime@unilem.org
            1·
            3 years ago

            Most tracking parameters actually just specify the source the link came from. Like Twitter or an email. I don’t see a lot of tracking parameters that literally are tried to an individual account. But here you seem to be saying that’s the most common type of tracking param

            • narwhal@lemmy.mlOP
              1·
              3 years ago

              Try sharing Instagram post or YouTube video from the apps.

              Instagram adds ‘igshid=’ . YouTube adds ‘si=’.

              Try sharing the same IG or YouTube content from different accounts. The ‘igshid’, ‘si’ param value will be different

              It can be used to tag who shares it, and who clicks on that specific url param.

              TikTok hides a ton of such params behind shortened url. Try expanding tiktok shared urls.

            • QuazarOmega@lemy.lol
              1·
              3 years ago

              I wouldn’t go as far as to say that once two people have clicked on the same tracking link the company behind it can tell what your relation is directly. What they will know is that the two or more people are connected in some way, to then infer in what way, they need other circumstantial data, maybe they have an account on that website and they share the surname or, even easier, without account they can tell that the requests came from IPs that come from a circumscribed area, and on and on, the more data points you add the better predictions the company can make.
              If several IPs from disparate places in the world use the same link they can probably tell that the link was shared on social media, not knowing which one, but it was sent in a public internet space at least

  • variants@possumpat.io
    1·
    3 years ago

    Yeah I always mention it when people send a link with all the extra stuff, how you can usually delete everything past the question mark

  • lurch (he/him)@sh.itjust.works
    1·
    3 years ago

    I sometimes leave some IDs in that don’t change and seem to track me as a person so the tracking mixes them up with me if the trackers don’t discard it on client change.

  • badlotus@lemm.ee
    1·
    3 years ago

    Brave includes “copy clean link” in the context menu in the desktop version.

  • FrostyCaveman@lemm.ee
    1·
    3 years ago

    I thought I was alone in my windmill-tilting on this one! Nice to see there are others who clean URLs of unnecessary querystring parameters