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Google Chrome pushes ahead with targeted ads based on your browser history
(www.theregister.com)
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this post was submitted on 06 Sep 2023
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It's crazy to think that this level of intrusion is considered fair game. The way these behaviors are normalized is completely dystopian.
They already did this with Youtube. I turned of Youtube history because I didn't want anyone being able to track what I watch. All of a sudden, Youtube's home page for my account was blank with a message that said "Turn on history if you want to see recommendations". I sat with that for a couple days, going to Youtube to check out channels I'd subscribed to. It wasn't the same. When I got to Youtube for some distraction, I want to discover something different from my usual stuff. So I delete my history weekly as part of "routine maintainence".
Same I delete all my history in clean state on youtube. I hate seeng videos thay I've already watched before.
Youtube let the other shoe drop in their end-stage enshittification this week. Last month, they required you to turn on Youtube History to view the feed of youtube videos recommendations. That seems reasonable, so I did it. But I delete my history every 1 week instead of every 3 months. So they don't get much from my choices. It still did a pretty good job of showing me stuff I was interested in watching.
Then on Oct 1, they threw up a "You're using an Ad Blocker" overlay on videos. I'd use my trusty Overlay Remover plugin to remove the annoying javascript graphic and watch what I wanted. I didn't have to click the X to dismiss the obnoxious page.
Last week, they started placing a timer with the X so you had to wait 5 seconds for the X to appear so you could dismiss blocking graphic.
Today, there was a new graphic. It allowed you to view three videos before you had to turn off your Ad Blocker. I viewed a video 3 times just to see what happens.
Now all I see is this: "Ad Blockers violate Youtube's Terms of Service"
Google has out and out made it a violation of their ToS to have an ad blocker to view Youtube. Or you can pay them $$$.
I ban such sites from my systems by replacing their DNS name in my hosts file routed to 127.0.0.1 which means I can't view the site. I have quite a few banned sites now.