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Comment by whywhywhywhy | Hacker News Reader

Was using private browsing to log in to work gmail last night and found it really creepy how it remained logged in across private tabs.

Thought the whole point of a private tab was to completely isolate a browsing session, now you can never be certain your Google credentials are not being shared in these private sessions or even contaminate my non-private sessions.

Going to have to use another browser for my work sessions from now on.

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> it remained logged in across private tabs.

If you mean "Incognito mode", then that's always happened. You need to close all tabs.

Exactly the same for FireFox's private browsing.

I don't use Chrome/Firefox but this surprises me, as well. The presence of a private browser window (anywhere) will prevent it from deleting cookies when you close this private browser window? That seems completely counterintuitive to me. When else, in any application, does the mere existence of an open, empty window completely change the behavior of a different window?

Safari's private tabs are each completely independent.

> The presence of a private browser window (anywhere) will prevent it from deleting cookies when you close this private browser window?

Yes. This is not new behavior. And yes, it frustrates people that assume each window is a separate incognito instance. It's not, and hasn't ever been.

> Safari's private tabs are each completely independent.

What happens when you middle click a link on a page that requires login?

I think Incognito tabs have always been this way in Chrome for as long as I remember (all currently open ones share a session). If you close all of them, the next one you open will be a clean slate.

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