JUNKBUSTERS Alert on Web Privacy

You can be tracked from your mouse clicks

Most people surf the net under the illusion that nobody will ever know what they look at. We want you to know what companies find out about you when you visit their web sites.

Your browser assembles each page by making ``HTTP requests'' for its text and graphics parts from one or more web sites. These sites may not have been named in the link you clicked on: two banner ads on the same page can come from different companies. Your browser gives all of them a lot of information you might prefer to keep private. Most sites store these details indefinitely.

How they know where you came from

The ``HTTP Referer'' tells them what led you to the request.
In this case it was not provided.

• If you use a search engine to find a site, the entire query you typed is typically handed to the sites you then click on.
• If you clicked on a banner advertisement, the URL may contain coded data used to target specific ads at you. (Before clicking on an ad, look at the URL displayed for it. Codes and long addresses suggest that your mouse clicks are being tracked.)
• If the URL you clicked on was in one of your private files, such as your email reader may use, the full file name is still handed over to the web site. It may contain information about you such as an indication of your name or email address, the email program you are using, and the structure of your file space.

Some advertisers choose which ad to show you based on two variables that tell them which computers you are coming through: the ``Remote Address'' (in your case 38.103.63.59) and the ``Remote host:'' (in your case not provided). These variables may give indications of where you live or work.

The ``User Agent'' variable, in your case CCBot/1.0 (+http://www.commoncrawl.org/bot.html), indicates what software and hardware you are using. This interests companies that sell these goods.

Some browsers actually hand over your email address or other indications of your identity. In your case it appears the ``HTTP From'' variable was not provided, and the ``REMOTE_USER'' variable was not provided.

The identity of a small percentage of surfers is disclosed by the ``REMOTE_IDENT'' variable; you can use our check on whether you are being revealed. This test is (quite rightly) blocked by many firewalls; just interrupt the transfer if you get an abnormal wait after clicking.

Web sites have other ways of finding out who you are. To learn how they can tell it's you every time you visit, read our page on cookies. For more information on privacy, see our Brief history of junk, or our page on what you can do to stop junk and the sale of information about you that makes you get it. By using a privacy-enhancing proxy server you can stop cookies and the disclosure of most of the information given above (but not the IP data).