I know Hiten personally, and I know that Kissmetrics operates in a most ethical fashion.
I would trust them over most any analytics company any day.
It's a shame that this meritless lawsuit even exists.
I would trust them over most any analytics company any day.
It's a shame that this meritless lawsuit even exists.
They used evercookie-ish methods to track people who don't want to be tracked. That's unethical, full stop.
Or let me ask the other way: Is it ethical to prevent deletion of cookies in order to track my browsing and intentionally hide the fact that they are doing that?
"Consumers who wish to opt out of all KISSmetrics tracking can use the free tools http://adblockplus.org & https://easylist.adblockplus.org/
It's completely absurd that people have to download anything to not be tracked - whether the data is anonymous, not shared between clients, etc. As mentioned, they are purposely defeating user intent. What about the next company after KISSmetrics that isn't as "ethical" w/ user data? That's why this type of thing needs to be stopped dead.
EDIT: little more clarity
From the paper summary : "The cache cookie method used ETags, and is capable of unique tracking even where all cookies are blocked by the user and “Private Browsing Mode” is enabled." Resuscitating cookies the user has cleared is simply wrong.
And you have an expansive definition of "ethical".
I should caveat this by saying that I wouldn't use an evercookie, though. While most vanishing cookies aren't privacy related, it's clear that a few are. We avoid all sorts of behaviors on the web to keep from treading on a few toes.
EDIT: But it is possible to detect case when cookies are intentionally deleted. Correct?
Browsers frequently eat cookies for no good reason. Safari has been the biggest offender in my experience, but I've seen it in several.
These are two really common issues I've personally dealt with, I know there are more but I can't think of them off the top of my head.
EDIT: No, I'm not aware of any way to detect how/why a cookie has been deleted. It just vanishes.