When you install device fingerprint on website you’re allowing third parties to track your online behavior and build detailed profiles about you. This information can be used to serve you ads, personalize content, and make decisions about whether you are eligible for a product or service. It can also be used for identification and authentication.
Device fingerprinting is a method for identifying devices based on their hardware, software, and network attributes. It’s sometimes called “machine identification,” and it can be done by apps, websites that use the right software, and IoT devices. A device’s fingerprint includes hardware information (screen resolution, CPU, and operating system), software configurations (browser and plugin settings, time zone and language settings, installed fonts), network properties (IP address and network type), and user behavior patterns (mouse movements and typing rhythm). Because different devices and browsers present data points in various formats or units, normalization is an important step for the device fingerprinting process.
How to Install Device Fingerprinting on Your Website
Unlike cookies, which store data locally on users’ machines, fingerprinting uses Javascript engine APIs to collect and record device-related attributes on merchant servers. This data is then compared against a database of known fingerprints to identify unique devices. This approach requires significant storage, but it makes device fingerprinting nearly impossible to block by users.
In spite of its limitations, device fingerprinting is gaining popularity for web analytics and advertising purposes, and it may soon replace cookies as the preferred tool for tracking user behavior. However, because it can be used to identify individual users, it’s a potential threat to privacy and is subject to regulations like GDPR and the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA).
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