Privacy-Friendly Hypertext? Do Not Track, Privacy Badger, and the Advertising-Funded Web

Presented at HOPE X (2014), July 20, 2014, 6 p.m. (60 minutes)

This talk will introduce the design and implementation of Privacy Badger, EFF's new browser extension that automatically blocks both invisible trackers and spying ads. It is intended to be a minimal- or zero-configuration option that most Internet users can use to prevent nonconsensual third party collection of their reading habits from their everyday browser. Privacy Badger couples the recently developed HTTP Do Not Track opt-out header with a number of heuristics for classifying the behavior of third parties to automatically determine which should be blocked, which are needed but should have cookies blocked, and which are safe from a privacy perspective. Peter will also talk about the bigger picture on the role that nonconsensual commercial surveillance has come to play in the business and technical infrastructure of the Web; and what we can do to build better alternatives.


Presenters:

  • Peter Eckersley
    Peter Eckersley is technology projects director for the Electronic Frontier Foundation. He keeps his eyes peeled for technologies that, by accident or design, pose a risk to computer users' freedoms - and then looks for ways to fix them. He explains gadgets to lawyers, and lawyers to gadgets. Peter's work at EFF has included privacy and security projects such as Panopticlick, HTTPS Everywhere, SSDI, and the SSL Observatory; helping to launch a movement for open wireless networks; fighting to keep modern computing platforms open; and running the first controlled tests to confirm that Comcast was using forged reset packets to interfere with P2P protocols. He holds a PhD in computer science and law from the University of Melbourne. His research focused on the practicality and desirability of using alternative compensation systems to legalize P2P file sharing and similar distribution tools, while still paying authors and artists for their work.

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