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GC Profile Updates to Facebook?!


Valkarie63

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Hi All - In updating my profile recently, I noticed the updates from GC.com were taking a long time to complete...then I notice the FireFox status meetings at the bottom of the browser.

<see attachment>

 

Who can tell me:

- why is there a connection between GC profile and FB?

- what information is being shipped over toe FB?

- how to disable any info exchange between GC and FB?

 

Thanks in advance for any info/insights/answers...

 

--V

 

GC-FB-Status.png

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When loading my profile I see few connections to Facebook even I am not a member of Facebook.

 

A connection to https://www.facebook.com/tr seems to be made only for tracking purposes. (I guess that "tr" in the URL means just tracking.)

In this connection at least my profile username with some tracking ID's are disclosed to Facebook.

Another connection to https://connect.facebook.net/en_US/fbevents.js is made for loading a javascript program from Facebook.

 

You can disable connections to Facebook by using your firewall to prevent connections to Facebook or just edit your hosts file

notepad %systemroot%\system32\drivers\etc\hosts

and add these lines

127.0.0.1 www.facebook.com
127.0.0.1 connect.facebook.net

(You may need an elevated command prompt to save changes)

This prevents your computer to connect to Facebook and makes Geocaching pages to load faster.

 

 

Edited by arisoft
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There can also be widgets for public use (whether or not you're logged in or have an account) such as a 'Share' button or 'Like' button. If not logged in those would pop up a log in. But the assets for display are typically also located on their servers.

I wouldn't assume anything antagonistic or shady just because you see a request to facebook.com (or other potential social media sites).

But as mentioned above, there are ways to block them if you are concerned and just want to play it safe.

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If you have logged in with Facebook, you should be able to remove the connection to Facebook here: https://www.geocaching.com/account/settings/authorizations
Just be sure that you have a valid password on geocaching.com first.

If you don't use Facebook on geocaching.com, it might simply be the tracking you're seeing: 
 

Quote

We use third party tools such as Google Analytics cookies, Facebook pixel, Localytics and Hotjar to track how you interact with our apps and websites, and the pages you visit.


If you are located in the EU or the EEC, and have not given explicit consent to this tracking, and they still track you, it is illegal.
In any case, blocking it is simple, and should be done anyway.

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36 minutes ago, thomfre said:


If you are located in the EU or the EEC, and have not given explicit consent to this tracking, and they still track you, it is illegal.
In any case, blocking it is simple, and should be done anyway.

 

A combination of Noscript, adblocker, Ghostery and Disconnect (and/or other add-ons) should take care of that (and not only on GS). It WILL break websites but you can add exceptions if really needed.

 

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Just now, on4bam said:

 

A combination of Noscript, adblocker, Ghostery and Disconnect (and/or other add-ons) should take care of that (and not only on GS). It WILL break websites but you can add exceptions if really needed.

 

I use Pi-Hole and uBlock Origin, takes care of everything. I recommend this, or similar setups, to everyone. Not only does it block nasty tracking, but it will also prevent some malicious code from executing.

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