The article was first published on Medium.
Good afternoon, dear friends, the most useful affiliate network Edu-Money is here again. Today we will talk about such a burning topic as privacy and anonymity on the internet. This topic will be especially useful for affiliates who use PBN or AdWords cloaking specialists.
Both of these types of traffic attraction are extremely popular in the custom writing niche (along with the doorways), so the article will be interesting for both beginners and experienced affiliates.
The main thing
A fingerprint, or sometimes a footprint, is a complete digital fingerprint of a device, consisting of information about your operating system, settings, active browsers, installed plugins, etc. This print is presented in the form of a unique code or a picture.
What is its difference from cookies? To begin with, cookies are relevant within the same domain, while the fingerprint allows you to track the sources of transition to the target site and transition paths from the site. Cookies, including eternal ones, can be cleared or blocked, which by the way is not a laborious process. In turn, fingerprints can only be replaced.
Fingerprints that we deserved
The most common, browser-based ones include:
- • Current IP;
- • Browser Headers (User Agent, HTTP, ACCEPT, Do Not Track);
- • Screen options;
- • JavaScript;
- • Information on turned on or off cookies and super cookies in the browser;
- • Installed browser plugins, their versions and updates.
You should not think that anonymous mode or switching the browser will help maintain privacy on the network. Anonymous mode does not block the data collection about the computer and the operating system, and modern trackers allow you to track information from different browsers on the same hardware and easily determine the end user. This technology is called Cross-Browser.
Fingerprinting and Cross-Browser allow you to track:
- • Operating system;
- • The number of processor cores;
- • List of fonts and installed languages;
- • Analysis of responses to operations performed by the browser, in which the operating system and computer hardware components are involved. ( lines rendering, volumetric figures, pictures, shadows creation, etc.). Such data is browser independent.
Now let’s discuss how to outwit fingerprints
VPN and proxies
Long story short, VPN is the easiest way to circumvent regional bans. It changes your IP to available one on the service. It does not protect you from many trackers and does not affect cookies that have already been picked up.
Proxies is a free gasket that does not encrypt your traffic.
Do not skimp on a good multi-channel VPN and turn it on even when switching to a dedicated server which we will talk about later.
Browsers
Firefox is considered the most reliable browser. You need to install such plugins on it as:
User Agent Switcher — the plugin performs the substitution of browser identification.
Antidetect — a plugin similar to the previous one, only with more advanced settings. This plugin is paid and quite expensive.
Ghoster is a plugin that blocks analytics, advertising and other beacon trackers.
Multiloginapp is a platform created to replace various browser footprints. The program is designed to work with a large number of browser profiles.
Each profile is placed in its own “container”, and the option that history, cookies and fingerprints will get transferred from one browser is excluded.
There are also specially built browsers for anonymous web surfing.
TOR is the most famous and popular browser among them, which is the gateway to the darknet.
Pale Moon is an open source browser based on Firefox.
Manually
Manual changes will help make your digital footprint less unique.
- • Changing the time zone of the device;
- • Setting a different language for the device’s operating system;
- • Setting a different browser language;
- • Changing the screen resolution of the device;
- • Web page zooming;
- • Installing or uninstalling browser plugins;
- • Disabling Flash, Javascript, and WebGL Execution.
These are radical methods that are extremely inconvenient for surfing.
Dedicated Servers
Using dedicated servers is still considered one of the most effective ways to maintain one’s anonymity. It is a separate physical machine from which no data is transferred to your main and working one.
Pros: Configuring an HTTP / SOCKS proxy or SSH / VPN connection to choose from; Monitoring query history; Comes to help when attacking via Flash, Java, JavaScript if you use a remote browser;
Cons: Relatively high cost. Technical knowledge required for proper setup.
The main reason for the popularity and effectiveness of this method is that such a virtual computer is completely new and clean for the Internet, it works around the clock and does not transmit any information about the end user and the characteristics of their computer (they say Facebook even tracks the MAC address).
Some more useful information:
Many people use the popular CloudFlare service to cover up the traces of their PBN. However, you cannot consider the service a panacea for moderation.
Test
After all the manipulations, you need to check all the relevant footprints that your browser sends. On these sites, All current information on these sites is actual.
When using Multiloginapp, check each profile:
Conclusions
The modern Internet collects a huge database of information about each of its users. This is mainly done by various sites for analytics, which is completely harmless. Some collect social information for organizations and the state, which is also not scary, unless you are involved in heavy crime, of course. For simple arbitrageurs who earn their daily bread on the Internet, you need to go through various moderation — Google, Facebook, etc. The Internet society is actively creating and promoting a variety of tools for maintaining online privacy, which on the one hand protect against scammers and on the other — help circumvent the rules for advertisers.
Even if you work in white niches and are not going to break any rules, it will not be superfluous to use the described tools and their analogues for comfortable and secure work on the network. VPN allows you to save money on services that offer different prices for their products to different GEOs. Multi-profile platforms allow you to organize and effectively manage a large number of accounts at the same time, while dedicated servers make it possible to safely test various bundles and adapt the product to different technical requirements.
Those who are confident users of their cloaking skills, raise their grids and have strengthened their security position after reading the article — we invite you to our affiliate program, where you can profitably monetize your work on students from Tier 1. After all, it seems The VPN-VDS-Multiloginapp-VPN bundle will never lose its relevance.
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