Ask Lemmy

26279 readers

1425 users here now

A Fediverse community for open-ended, thought provoking questions

Rules: (interactive)

1) Be nice and; have fun

Doxxing, trolling, sealioning, racism, and toxicity are not welcomed in AskLemmy. Remember what your mother said: if you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all. In addition, the site-wide Lemmy.world terms of service also apply here. Please familiarize yourself with them

2) All posts must end with a '?'

This is sort of like Jeopardy. Please phrase all post titles in the form of a proper question ending with ?

3) No spam

Please do not flood the community with nonsense. Actual suspected spammers will be banned on site. No astroturfing.

4) NSFW is okay, within reason

Just remember to tag posts with either a content warning or a [NSFW] tag. Overtly sexual posts are not allowed, please direct them to either [email protected] or [email protected]. NSFW comments should be restricted to posts tagged [NSFW].

5) This is not a support community.

It is not a place for 'how do I?', type questions. If you have any questions regarding the site itself or would like to report a community, please direct them to Lemmy.world Support or email [email protected]. For other questions check our partnered communities list, or use the search function.

Reminder: The terms of service apply here too.

Partnered Communities:

Logo design credit goes to: tubbadu

founded 1 year ago

MODERATORS

[email protected]

What is the privacy/security concern with canvas in web browsers? (lemmy.world)

submitted 1 year ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

4 comments fedilink hide all child comments

I have installed librawolf and I see that canvas access is disabled by default in all webpages so I started activating them when they bother me (whatsapp, youtube, element.io etc.). But then I figure that it is disabled for a reason. What should I pay attention to?

top 4 comments

sorted by: hot top controversial new old

[–] [email protected] 13 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

According to wikipedia

Canvas fingerprinting is one of a number of browser fingerprinting techniques for tracking online users that allow websites to identify and track visitors using the HTML5 canvas element instead of browser cookies or other similar means. The technique received wide media coverage in 2014 after researchers from Princeton University and KU Leuven University described it in their paper The Web never forgets.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canvas_fingerprinting

Also if you just google "librewolf canvas disabled", their FAQ shows up with the exact reason why https://librewolf.net/docs/faq/#should-i-allow-canvas-access-how-do-i-do-it

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

The FBI will literally storm ur house and kick your dog if you leave canvas enabled

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

Canvas rendering differs slightly depending on a lot of factors like operating system, browser, installed fonts, and many others. This information can be used to uniquely identify and track your machine across the web, even if you have stuff like cookies blocked and switch IPs. Just outright blocking canvas access attempts to prevent this. Keep in mind that while it can help prevent against canvas tracking, it can also be used as yet another variable to uniquely identify your browser, 'has canvas blocking enabled', just like blocking cookies, do not track requests, etc...

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

There are a number of websites that can tell you if your browser's fingerprint is unique and thus if you are trackable. Truth is, it always is because of the sheer number of variables involved, unless you're willing to disable a lot more than canvas, which breaks a lot more websites. Even Tor is more private despite having so many of their nodes ran by governments.