Making out your identity

Two of the largest players in the business of making out your online identity and tracking online consumption habits are Google and Alexa. This week:

• Google clarifies that they have not done anything to improve cookie privacy.
• Alexa is going after Firefox users with their sparkling, new add-on.

No changes in the cookiejar

Google's information cookies—previously set to expire sometime in 2038—will expire after 18 months. Google says this is one of the steps the company is taking to improve privacy. However:

(…) users who do not return to Google will have their cookies auto-expire after 2 years. Regular Google users will have their cookies auto-renew, so that their preferences are not lost.

In other words: Nothing has rally changed. Google's cookies will still be able to track individual users for years and years. Provided that users does not empty their browser's cookiejar, or search less than once every two year.

Alexa chasing the 'fox

Ten years after the Internet Explorer toolbar, Alexa release their official Firefox add-on called Sparky. The add-on is surprisingly not a toolbar!

Sparky adds some additional statistics about the current page in the status bar, as well as a new menu item for related links. Users can see the current site's current rank, and a graph with it's ranking history. The official add-on is better than the third party add-ons that have been available for some time. It is actually faster than the third party add-ons, and it looks better.

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