this post was submitted on 24 Aug 2023
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Privacy
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You're thinking about canvas fingerprinting, but there are APIs which cannot be faked without messing with functionality, and there are enough of them to obtain a unique fingerprint even if you omit the canvas. Which advertisers can easily do if they figure out you're faking your canvas.
A lower entropy fingerprint plus the IP can still identify you across browsers. If you compare the results of the EFF test in the two browsers you'll see that most of the values will be the same.
I'm sorry. I must have misunderstood. You just said that different browsers from the same IP address can be linked to the same person.
I find that difficult to believe, here's a counter example, a VPN endpoint. There's many different people with that originating IP address using different browsers. Being able to identify two that an individual is using would be very difficult.
Browser fingerprinting fingerprints a browser, not a user, not a computer. A browser. I would love to see data contradicting that, but I am not aware of that data
But how much of the fingerprint data comes from stuff that's common across browsers? Do the EFF test in a completely different browser and see how much will be the same in Chrome vs Firefox vs Librewolf for example.
That's a good point and it's always worth testing any setup you have.
My mullvad browser passes the fingerprint.com test with flying colors, it doesn't share system fonts and the like. That plus a VPN would make it really hard to say the librewolf browser and tbe mullvsd browser belong to the same person.
I still think there's value in using separate browsers for the scenario the original poster outlayed