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Is Google Chrome’s New Privacy Feature Enough to Stop Online Spying?
When you use Incognito mode in Google Chrome, you might think your online activity is completely private. The browser window itself tells you that it won’t save your history, cookies, or information you enter into forms.
While this is helpful for keeping your activity hidden from others who use your device, it doesn’t make you invisible on the internet. The websites you visit, your internet service provider, and your school or employer can still see what you’re doing.
To address this privacy gap, Google is testing a powerful new feature for Chrome on Windows 11 called “Script Blocking in Incognito”. This tool is a significant upgrade designed to combat a sneaky tracking method known as browser fingerprinting. It represents a welcome step toward making private browsing truly more private.
The Problem of Digital Fingerprinting
Imagine you’re walking through a crowded market. You’re not wearing a name tag, so nobody knows who you are. However, a detective could still identify you by noting your unique combination of features: your height, the color of your coat, the brand of your shoes, and the style of your watch.
Browser fingerprinting works in a similar way. Websites can run scripts that collect small, seemingly harmless pieces of information about your device and browser. These can include:
- The fonts you have installed
- Your screen resolution
- Your browser version
- Your language settings
- Information about your graphics card (via WebGL) and audio hardware
Individually, these details are not very revealing. But when combined, they can create a unique “fingerprint” that identifies your device with startling accuracy. This allows companies to track you across different websites, building a profile of your habits and interests, even without using traditional cookies.
How Script Blocking Fights Back
Google’s new feature acts like a vigilant security guard for your browser in Incognito mode. It specifically targets third-party scripts that are known to perform this kind of fingerprinting.
It works using a list-based approach. Google maintains a “Marked Domain List” (MDL) of domains that are known to misuse web technologies for re-identification. When you visit a website in Incognito mode with this feature enabled, Chrome checks all the scripts that the site tries to load. If a script comes from a third-party domain on that blocklist, Chrome simply stops it from running.
By blocking the script, Chrome prevents it from gathering the bits of data needed to form your digital fingerprint. The unique ID is never created, so you cannot be tracked from that site to another using this method.
When the feature actively blocks a script, you’ll see a small “eye” icon appear in your address bar, letting you know it’s working. You can click this icon to disable the protection for a specific website if you choose.
A Step Forward, Not a Final Solution
This new script-blocking feature is a major improvement for Incognito mode’s privacy. However, it’s important to understand its limitations. Because it relies on a blocklist, it will only stop known fingerprinting scripts. New or unknown scripts might not be on the list and could still track you.
Furthermore, this protection is currently limited only to Incognito mode. Other browsers like Mozilla Firefox and Apple’s Safari have more aggressive tracking protection that works across all browsing, not just in a private mode.
Google’s approach is more conservative, aiming to improve privacy in a specific context without disrupting the normal browsing experience for all users. In some cases, blocking these scripts might cause parts of a website to not function correctly, which is why users are given the option to disable it.
This feature is part of Google’s larger Privacy Sandbox initiative, which seeks to develop new web technologies that protect user privacy while still allowing publishers and developers to run their businesses. It shows a commitment to tackling complex privacy challenges on the modern web, enhancing the protections against cross-site tracking when users most expect it.