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New research highlights privacy abuse involving Meta and Yandex


An international research collaboration discovered a potential privacy abuse involving Meta and Yandex bridging persistent identifiers to browsing histories. Native Android apps, such as Facebook or Instagram, silently listen on fixed local ports.

An international research collaboration between IMDEA Networks’ Internet Analytics Group, headed by Narseo Vallina-Rodriguez, Gunes Acar(Radboud University), and Tim Vlummens (KU Leuven, Belgium), has uncovered a potential privacy abuse involving Meta and the Russian tech giant Yandex. By embedding tracking code into millions of websites, Meta’s Pixel and Yandex Metrica have been able to map Android users' browsing habits with their persistent identities (that is to say, with the account holder logged in). Gunes Acar, Assistant Professor at Radboud University, who co-led the investigation and made the initial discovery, highlights: “Not only did Meta fail to inform website owners about this tracking method, it also ignored their complaints and questions."

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