# Anyone Explain This?



## mosaix (Aug 15, 2020)

My daughter works for Warwick University and is working from home. 

As part of her work she logs in to the University network via a VPN. 

She is currently maintaining a university database of companies her department deal with. She’s been visiting these companies websites to pick up details for the database. At no time did she provide any of her personal details to these websites. 

An ad appeared from one of these companies on her mobile phone the day after she visited its website - via the vpn. She has absolutely no personal connection with the company and has made no relevant, connected searches on her pc or mobile. 

I’m at a loss.


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## Brian G Turner (Aug 15, 2020)

My expectation is that she's using a normal browser to visit the websites, and that she's picked up an advertising cookie. If her phone is synced to her desktop then I would expect the same ad to display. Even if not synced, Google can probably work it out by IP.

It's nothing malicious or to worry about - it's simply a statistical trigger.

That's my initial thought, anyway.


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## AlexH (Aug 15, 2020)

Facebook, Google etc. leave cookies that can save information about websites that have been visited. Many websites have some sort of Facebook embed, for example. So if she logged into Facebook or Google on both devices, for example, Facebook/Google may know the websites she visited if they have Facebook/Google tracking code. The tracking code could be from a Facebook 'Like' button, for example. This information would be contained in your daughter's Facebook/Google account. It's possible to switch this tracking and targeted adverts off in Facebook and Google's privacy settings.

Facebook, Google etc. aren't really free. Users pay by giving away their data, as most people don't review the privacy settings.


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## Foxbat (Aug 15, 2020)

I must admit, I hate the new regs regarding cookies. I’m naturally suspicious of everybody and everything. At least before, I didn’t know what was going on in the background. Now that I can find out on almost any site through managing cookies (and see the names of companies I’ve never heard of) I rarely visit any site that I am not already familiar with. As soon as the alert comes up about cookies, I mostly just leave the site. It’s kind of killed my browsing stone dead. Sometimes ignorance really is bliss.


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## mosaix (Aug 15, 2020)

Brian G Turner said:


> My expectation is that she's using a normal browser to visit the websites, and that she's picked up an advertising cookie. If her phone is synced to her desktop then I would expect the same ad to display. Even if not synced, Google can probably work it out by IP.
> 
> It's nothing malicious or to worry about - it's simply a statistical trigger.
> 
> That's my initial thought, anyway.



The browser she’s using is on a server on the University campus accessed via a VPN. 

Her desktop should be immune because of the VPN. 

There’s no link between the University and her mobile.


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## M. Robert Gibson (Aug 15, 2020)

Do you want to know creepy?

I have an ad blocker installed (Ublock Origin) - I have it set to 'paranoid' meaning I disallow all third party scripts and frames and I can control which scripts can run.  I also disallow all cookies with my browser (Vivaldi)

I navigate to this page




__





						Round the world in eighty days | WorldCat.org
					

Round the world in eighty days | WorldCat.org




					www.worldcat.org
				




All well and good, but the section 'Find a copy in the library' does not load.
If I allow 'ajax.googleapis.com' then the section loads...
But, the 'Enter your location' box has the first part of my postcode already entered!

That's because Google has my address somewhere (possibly my YouTube account), or it's using my ip address so it knows approximately where I am





						What Is My IP Address? IP Address Tools and More
					

IP address lookup, location, proxy detection, email tracing, IP hiding tips, blacklist check, speed test, and forums. Find, get, and show my IP address.



					whatismyipaddress.com


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## mosaix (Aug 15, 2020)

M. Robert Gibson said:


> Do you want to know creepy?
> 
> I have an ad blocker installed (Ublock Origin) - I have it set to 'paranoid' meaning I disallow all third party scripts and frames and I can control which scripts can run.  I also disallow all cookies with my browser (Vivaldi)
> 
> ...



It’s to ‘improve your browsing experience’ no doubt, MRG.


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## Astro Pen (Aug 15, 2020)

For anything outside chrons and a few trusted basic sites I use VPN + firefox in private browsing, sandbox,adblock and no script. 
The above have worked pretty well. If you are still paranoid you can turn off disk caching so the browser only runs in memory. (Though you will need a decent amount of ram to do that

Youtube still recommends videos based on the content any gmail attachments like manuscripts. Everything is set to private but it still does it because google are above the law in case you were unaware of that. 

I don't use a mobile telephone, facebook, or twitter. Nor will I risk the cloud whatever that is. So joining my dots doesn't draw much of a donkey, but most people under 50 have a pretty total cross connectivity. 
NB.Amazon alone have you profiled beyond your nightmares. I have posted this before but it is worth knowing if you didn't catch it.








						Amazon: How Bezos built his data machine
					

Leo Kelion investigates the rise of Amazon and its huge data-gathering operation




					www.bbc.co.uk


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## Narkalui (Sep 8, 2020)

So a colleague of mine is half polish (he speaks it with a South London accent - very amusing). So he and his brother are speaking to each other in Polish in the presence of my colleague's girlfriend and within hours her Bacefook feed is filling with Polish adverts. Only possible explanation: her phone heard and recognised Polish being spoken (in spite of the South London accents) and Bacefook picked up on this.

Scary...


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## tinkerdan (Sep 8, 2020)

My thought would be that her end of the VPN-which requires some sort of software. Has not been set to maximum privacy.
In fact, if she's using a free utility to access the VPN then that might be the problem.
Check VPN software configuration to see if there are varying levels of security.

I always shut off all of the Windows 10 utilities that facilitate pushing browser information to various device and to alerts just because of these types of problems.
There are also pluggins in browsers that I disable because of this.

I think once you link your 'smart' phone to things like your internet provider and passwords for every website and cable services--that you are opening up the possibilities for all this to happen.


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## Narkalui (Sep 8, 2020)

Thanks @tinkerdan I'll try to remember all of that and pass it on


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## Phyrebrat (Sep 10, 2020)

My brother was killed in 2011 - I had been talking on my mobile to my folks about the funeral and getting the body back from Saudi where he was run over. Later I started getting served funeral ads on Facebook.

It took me until 2019 to delete my FB account - requested my data... still waiting.

pH


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## Narkalui (Sep 10, 2020)

I'm very tempted to write to Bacefook with a Subject Access Request just to see what happens...


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