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Comment by danielsamuels | Hacker News Reader

It's also been in Chrome for years.

In the form of an official Chrome extension that was discontinued just over two years ago.

How is it different from the native functionality in Chrome that lets you see (and open) any tabs you have open in Chrome across any device?

The difference is that you can push a tab from one device to another. So if you're reading something on your phone, and push it to your laptop, it will automatically open in a new tab there once it syncs. It's good for when you're on the go, and want to remember to read something later on once you get back to your computer.

By the way, Firefox also has the feature you mention (view tabs that are open on devices).

Ah, I guess the benefit of "pushing" a tab shows in stateful applications or something, so it keeps the same "state" on the new device? Or, does it keep the same distance scrolled down the page so you can pick up where you were?

I'm confused because I open desktop session links from my mobile all the time and I'm curious if there's features I'm missing out on by pushing from one device to another, instead of syncing.

For example, if I open Chrome, I see the tabs open across all my other computers[1] and I usually just resume relevant tabs from there. It keeps me logged in, but sometimes reverts things like filters or sorting (on-page JS) unless it is part of the URL. It doesn't scroll me where I was in a page either, which would be nice.

[1] http://i.imgur.com/MgPCMy2.png

But doesn't Chrome send your data through Google?

Yes, though you can encrypt it locally before it does so.

But do you do? (Honest question; I mean: is there a reliable and easy way to enforce encryption happens?)

Yes, it's a simple option in the settings: https://i.imgur.com/0np3ItM.png

Oh okay, didn't know Chrome provided this feature natively, I thought you were referring to some kind of crazy DIY encrypt-things-behind-Chrome's-back monitoring script setup.

Thanks, and thanks for the precise screenshot :)

It's not on by default though, meaning most users will be passing data their browsing data through Google unencrypted. Not only tabs but cookies, full browser history...

I'm always surprised that no one seems to think this a big deal. People will install and recommend tracking-blocking extensions while allowing Google to hoover up all this data without a second thought.

By default Google encrypts it. Its clearly in that picture

No, danielsamuels has manually changed that setting. The default is to only encrypt saved passwords: https://www.spinda.net/files/chromesync.png

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