Firefox 's Ping Attribute: Useful or Spyware?

An anonymous reader writes "The Mozilla Team has quietly enabled a new feature in Firefox that parses 'ping' attributes to anchor tags in HTML. Now links can have a 'ping' attribute that contains a list of servers to notify when you click on a link. Although link tracking has been done using redirects and Javascript, this new "feature" allows notification of an unlimited and uncontrollable number of servers for every click, and it is not noticeable without examining the source code for a link before clicking it."

Firefox's Ping Attribute: Useful AND Spyware

This isn't a question, it's obviously a little of both. Sacrifice some information about the sites you visit to allow those who run the servers (anyone, really) some feedback and statistics.

It's simply the user's choice as to whether or not the pros outweigh the cons. And I'm sure the massive response that ensues on Slashdot will reveal that everyone values these pros and cons differently.

Doesn't seem to be much argument other than I think they should have a very simple way to disable this if the user so chooses. As with the iTunes fiasco [slashdot.org], I would recommend Firefox be distributed with this option disabled.

Re:Firefox's Ping Attribute: Useful AND Spyware

Nooo! Here in the US, the media polarizes two options and have people in bow ties argue it. You're either in agreement with this idea or totally against it.

Re:Firefox's Ping Attribute: Useful AND Spyware

You were moderated as funny, but it should've been insightful. I have a friend who describes the American political scene as two armies in trenches, shooting at straw men in no-man's-land.

Re:Firefox's Ping Attribute: Useful AND Spyware

Except that there are really one sides and they are employing a huge mirror...

Re:Don't like Firefox spyware? Use Konqueror

This is an important point. An AJAX application will quite merrily send and recieve large quantities of data without you knowing - this is by design. It relies on being able to do things 'behind the user's back'.

Think of it this way - if you had a popup every time a local application wanted to communicate with the hard disk, how quickly would you become angry?

Re:Don't like Firefox spyware? Use Konqueror

In some instances, it may render web pages even better than Firefox, since Konqueror passed the Acid2 test.

Acid2 only measures the particular edgecasitis that the Acid2 authors managed to think of - web developers seem capable of introducing many more. What's needed isn't more acid tests but a W3-approved regression suite.

Re:Firefox's Ping Attribute: Useful AND Spyware

As with the iTunes fiasco, I would recommend Firefox be distributed with this option disabled.

I'm racking my brain to imagine why a user would ever want to enable it.

RTA

I'm racking my brain to imagine why a user would ever want to enable it.

So as to avoid expensive and hidden redirects.

Re:RTA

but they're not expensive to the user. No website can use this as a primary mechanism in a process as less than 1% of their users will have it enabled. So, it can only be used for things that are optional to the website, for example user tracking. And in this case it actually generates more traffic, as now you just parse your logs (or put an image in, wherein we have a mechanism that does exactly the same thing anyway).

Re:RTA

Firstly they are expensive to the user, as you have to wait for the response to come back before being able to move onto the next page and secondly being expensive for the web server does indirectly effect users.

Sure your one redirect query may not effect you much but tens of thousands of people doing it could slow a server right down.

You can already do this with Javascript

I would recommend Firefox be distributed with this option disabled.

Are you also recommending that Firefox be distributed with Javascript disabled? Because this ping functionality is easy enough to implement in javascript. If ping is disabled by default, then nobody will have it enabled, which means that web developers will continue to do it the old fashioned way, and the ability to disable ping will be worthless.

Doug Moen.

Re:You can already do this with Javascript

Use the Firefox NoScript extension and you can be selective about what javascript you run on a per-site basis.

Re:You can already do this with Javascript

Are you also recommending that Firefox be distributed with Javascript disabled?

I know that I HAVE JavaScript disabled (using the NoScript extension) for this and other reasons, and I don't want to have that functionality back whithout me noticing.

Hurga

Re:You can already do this with Javascript

Consider a simple redirect URL.

Which can be easily bypassed.

Bypassed? That may demand definition, for example,

Where does http://tinyurl.com/161 [tinyurl.com] go?

How about http://freshmeat.net/redir/cexec/57387/url_homepag e/ [freshmeat.net]?

How do you know without making a URL connection?

Oh sure, you can ignore links that look like that, and even block them. Nobody's suggesting that you cannot block PING-requested URLs.

But bypassed? What exactly could you mean by this?

Re:You can already do this with Javascript

Why would a web developer use the ping attribute now? AFAIK only Firefox supports it.

it's all about Google adwords

Why would a web developer use the ping attribute now?

I think the main developer who would want to use it is Google with their adwords program. They're probably trying to minimize the bandwidth those redirects consume for all the clicking that happens on their ads. This is on top of the bandwidth of every page view requesting the ads to be embedded in the first place, which can't be avoided...

Even if Google can shave off 6% of unneccessary redirects (all Firefox users), that's a big bandwidth savings.

Seth

Re:it's all about Google adwords

"I think the main developer who would want to use it is Google with their adwords program. They're probably trying to minimize the bandwidth those redirects consume for all the clicking that happens on their ads.

Google gets paid for those clicks on their ads. They don't need to be altering my browser to help their business anyway. As bender would say, Google can bite my shiney metal 4$$. Hopefully distros will patch firefox, so their users won't need to fret about this. Just those windows users who get it straight from the firefox site.

I've been thinking it's time for a firefox fork that drops the MPL. The dual licensing is preventing integration of other GPLed work - like a built in PDF viewer so we can avoid Adobe. A GPL only fork would help prevent folks like Google from creating their own branded browser with stupid features no user would ever want.

Possible fix

Why not limit the ping to the server that made the current page? This should prevent people from embedding pings into blogs, and still allow the replacement of redirects for tracking where you go. I would think unless this is done, too many people will disable it for any real sites to use it, and it will *only* be used for nefarious purposes.

Re:Possible fix

Did you read the article, or the WHATWG spec?

It specifically mentions:

1. Links with the "ping" attribute should be diffrentiated from other links.
2. There should client-side options to control "ping" behavior, similar to current cookie options: "respond to all", "ignore 3rd party", "ignore all".

FWIW, this really seems dead in the water. First, not too many users will have it enabled (or even available, for that matter). Second, this information is already being reliably collected with cookies, mod_usertrack [apache.org], javascript, and page redirect tricks -- mostly with no knowledge of the enduser.

Why go with a little-available, easily disable mechanisim when the tried-and-true method is already available?

Re:You can already do this with Javascript

Ever heard of cross-site scripting? "ping" needs at the least to be implemented in such a fashion that only the originating site can get a ping. Any pings to non-originating site should either be blocked wholesale or at least present the user a dialog (Site A is attempting to convey information about your browsing to Site B).

Re:Firefox's Ping Attribute: Useful AND Spyware

As I see it this will only make it easier to avoid tracking. At the moment tracking links are often obfuscated like this one [slashdot.org]. With this new attribute and the ability to disable it you get a plain non-tracked destination URL.

Because of this, and it being mozilla-specific for now, websites that currently use tracking URL's will see no value in switching over.

As for privacy concerns, it's already quite easy to track people on the web. Those who avoid it now are more in the know and would probably just add this to the list of things to disable.

Re:Firefox's Ping Attribute: Useful AND Spyware

I would recommend Firefox be distributed with this option disabled

Which would give web developers no reason to ever bother using it, and they'll continue doing the same little tricks they've been using for years to keep you from seeing that they're tracking the links.

Take a look at the HTML source on Fark -- you'll see javascript to overwrite the status line so it doesn't show it's tracking you ... and there are hundreds, if not thousands or millions of other sites that do the same.

Re:Firefox's Ping Attribute: Useful AND Spyware

The blog is right that from a user perspective this is good because it makes the target page load faster and makes the tracking transparent. However, this gives the marketer or website even less control than they have now.

Today, ad or other link tracking is generally handled like this: The link target specifies a tracking page and passes in a magic word or number that specifies the campaign or other info (e.g., "go.php?id=123" or "click.asp?campaign=A1254S"). That page logs the click in some database and issues a redirect to the actual destination page. Sometimes the web server log acts as the "database" and the click stats are processed from the logs.

With this new scheme, idea is supposed to be that the href target would be the actual destination and there would be no need for the time-consuming redirect. The separate ping attribute would take care of notifying the server similar to what happens today. But now the target page is out in the open for the client to see, and it is not essential to use the ping URL at all! Once users start blocking ping URLs, as they inevitably will, this transparency means that click stats will be very unreliable.

Since a lot of revenue depends on click numbers, this outcome is bad for commercial web sites. Therefore, very few money links will ever use this scheme and will instead stay with the tried-and-true redirect pages.

Consider what may happen

I think the first thing any browser developer should consider when adding a new tag or tag attribute to the DOM is "How can this be abused?" and explore that question to its fullest. Because all of you know that it will be abused and that users will implement it wrong or find new uses for it that the developers didn't intend. Some of them may be good, some bad.

Required!

At least for childbirth. Bring in the machine that goes, PING!

Coming soon to a browser near you:

One ping-disabling Firefox extension.

Very useful

This feature is extremely useful for any website that wants to give their users better content by parsing what they're going through. It also lets you figure out who is clicking advertisements (which are usually off site) and even gives you the ability to run a multitude of websites but aggregate all the statistics on one of your machines.

Sure it can be abused -- I don't see why more of these abusive features can't be set up in a whitelist fashion. I'm already shocked that web browsers make it so difficult to white lists sites you feel are safe (or don't mind giving up some information to make your experience better).

That comes to the point of this post -- how about a standard "setup" logo/button committee that helps create a "setup" web profile that sites can use to give the users options on how they want to be configured? We've got some standard buttons already (RSS feed, etc), why not one that users could be familiar with so that they can white list or opt-in to certain additional "anti-privacy" features?

I know many websites (including a few of mine) could use more user information, and I don't see why we can't work to just setting a standard for how to do it.

Re:Not very useful

Mozilla team is pulling an IE (implementing their own extensions... read the blog...

WHATWG != Mozilla

Mozilla is attempting an implementation of a standard set by an independent standards body. No, they're not the W3C, but like you pseudo-quoted out of context, "w3c doesn't have to make all the rules."

Re:With or without your consent?

Does this feature track and retain your surfing habits without your consent?

No.

Can you not opt-out of it?

Disable the feature. Easy.

It's not spyware by your definition. It has the added benefit of giving the user some control instead of being secretly tracked by the server side.