The discussion revolves around the Discourse-fingerprint plugin, which aims to identify duplicate users by matching browser fingerprints. pfaffman installed the plugin but found it unclear, as it only lists “matches” without indicating which users share the same fingerprint. After reviewing the plugin’s descriptionFalco, pfaffman suspects that the listed users might all be using iOS, which could explain the identical fingerprints. codinghorror confirms that iOS makes fingerprinting difficult by design. The conversation also touches on the challenges of fingerprinting, with Stephen criticizing Apple’s approach and sam mentioning that Firefox will soon make fingerprinting harder.
I installed the plugin but it just gives a list of “matches”, but I can’t tell what is matching what. Clicking on a user in the list doesn’t change anything.
Is it that all of those users have the same fingerprint?
I thought that I’d seen a topic about this plugin here, but I can’t find it now. The plugin itself links to meta and not a particular topic.
Not today, as I was unable to find it. It’s closed and doesn’t link to the repo. I sort of remember it, though.
So I’d think that there’d be some indication which users share the same fingerprints, but either all of the users identified have the same fingerprint, or I simply don’t understand the interface.
I think I remember something that suggested that everyone using . . . uh, some Apple product (iPhone, maybe?) would have the same fingerprint, so maybe these are all people using Discourse from an iPhone?