Brave browser cuts off another avenue for tracking your web activity
Brave software is taking the fight to bounce tracking
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In order to further protect users of itsbrowserfrom unwanted tracking online, Brave Software has announced in a newblog postthat it will add debouncing protection toBrave.
Bounce tracking is yet another technique websites use to follow users around the web. The technique itself works by injecting additional sites between a site a user is currently visiting and another site they want to navigate to. Over time these intermediate sites learn what websites a user has visited which allows them to perform tracking in a similar way to usingthird-party cookies.
Beginning with version 1.32 of Brave on desktop, the browser will protect users against bounce tracking by automatically recognizing when they are about to visit a known trackingdomain, skipping visiting the tracking site all together and instead directly navigating a user to their intended destination.
Brave Software’s new debouncing feature is currently available in nightly versions of Brave but will be rolled out to all users soon.
Debouncing in Brave
With its new debouncing feature, Brave not only protects users against bounce tracking on websites but also bounce-tracking URLs used in other places across the web including links inaffiliate marketingemails.
In order to know which URLs employ bouncing tracking, the companymaintains a listonGitHubthat is drawn from a mix of crowd-sourced and existingopen sourceprojects including the URL Tracking Stripper, Link Clearer and Clear URLs extensions. However, additional rules are also maintained by Brave Software and the company plans to keep this list up to date and add more bounce-tracking URLs to it going forward.
Debouncing isn’t the only bounce tracking protection in Brave though as the browser utilizes query parameter stripping and warns users when they are about to visit a suspected bounce tracking site.
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In addition to bringing debouncing to its browser, Brave Software is also working with theW3Cto help standardize protections against bounce tracking so that they can be implemented by other browsers as well.
After working with the TechRadar Pro team for the last several years, Anthony is now the security and networking editor at Tom’s Guide where he covers everything from data breaches and ransomware gangs to the best way to cover your whole home or business with Wi-Fi. When not writing, you can find him tinkering with PCs and game consoles, managing cables and upgrading his smart home.
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