{"slug": "fingerprint", "name": "Fingerprint", "category": "browsers", "category_name": "Browsers and extensions", "description": "", "recommenders": 6, "commenters": 7, "warners": 2, "score": 2.612, "rising": -0.64, "first": "2025-11-22", "latest": "2026-10-12", "why": "I always point people to https://fingerprint.com/ to see if their browser can defeat it.", "why_is_quote": true, "has_verdict": false, "sentiment": {"recommend": 5, "neutral": 1, "compare": 0, "warn": 1}, "spark": [1, 0, 1, 0, 0, 0, 2, 0, 0, 0, 0, 1], "listed": true, "loved": [], "caveat": "", "short_quote": "I always point people to https://fingerprint.com/ to see if their browser can defeat it.", "kind": "", "icon": true, "domain": "fingerprint.com", "github_repo": null, "official_url": "https://fingerprint.com", "pricing": "", "aliases": ["Fingerprint", "FingerprintJS", "Fingerprint.com", "fingerprint.com"], "verdict": null, "praise": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 800800912, "item_id": 50050057, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50050057", "by": "nilslindemann", "date": "2026-10-12", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Test with https://fingerprint.com/.", "excerpt": "I have experienced the same with Google and with PayPal, whenever I used Tor. When I afterwards visited those sites using my normal browser I got Captchas. They are actively fighting attempts to avoid fingerprinting. Also, I am pretty sure that no browser protects against getting fingerprinted. Test with https://fingerprint.com/.", "context": "", "use_case": "testing browser fingerprinting", "switched_from": "", "story": "Fingerprints are the new cookies"}, {"id": 769080656, "item_id": 48067541, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48067541", "by": "shimman", "date": "2026-05-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "their JS lib doing this is quite good", "excerpt": "Don't know about easy but their JS lib doing this is quite good: https://github.com/fingerprintjs/fingerprintjs Honestly surprised to see it licensed as MIT now too. It was something less permissive before. They aren't doing anything too crazy, more like being the first ones to be open about it. I couldn't imagine what else companies like Google or Meta or TikTok can extract out of it that no one else can't. Integrat", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "A web page that shows you everything the browser told it without asking"}, {"id": 769041792, "item_id": 48065112, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48065112", "by": "Cider9986", "date": "2026-05-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I prefer https://fingerprint.com/demo", "excerpt": "I prefer https://fingerprint.com/demo Terrible company-at least you know you are testing what is being used.", "context": "", "use_case": "Browser fingerprinting demo", "switched_from": "", "story": "A web page that shows you everything the browser told it without asking"}, {"id": 761947714, "item_id": 47621732, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47621732", "by": "varenc", "date": "2026-04-02", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I like this demo for testing my browser's resilence against fingerprinting", "excerpt": "> A few years ago, intentionally fingerprinting or tracking your users without disclosure was spyware and unethical. Alas, here we are. For over 15 years reCAPTCHA has relied on browser fingerprinting to help distinguish humans from bots. And fingerprintjs.com has been around for well more than a couple years. That said, sniffing the browser extensions someone is using is NOT a common fingerprinting method used by my", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "LinkedIn Is Illegally Searching Your Computer"}, {"id": 745397872, "item_id": 46587367, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46587367", "by": "alexcroox", "date": "2026-01-12", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "This open source one does work between incognito and normal session", "excerpt": "It shows I've visited twice already, from different countries, IPs and browsers. I don't think this works. This open source one does work between incognito and normal session: https://fingerprintjs.github.io/fingerprintjs/", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: DevicePrint \u2013 device fingerprinting without cookies"}]}], "caveats": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 773226561, "item_id": 48326660, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48326660", "by": "Cider9986", "date": "2026-05-29", "stance": "warn", "quote": "gives you +3 suspicious score just for using privacy settings like adblock", "excerpt": "CAPTCHAs are great. Exploiters get around them with proprietary anti-detect browsers and unethical residential proxies, while privacy browsers and affordable privacy VPNs get blocked and shadowbanned to death. Fingerprint.com, while not a CAPTCHA, gives you +3 suspicious score just for using privacy settings like adblock on your browser. This makes it harder to sign up for any sites that use fingerprint.com. https://", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "CAPTCHAs can still detect AI agents"}, {"id": 761844272, "item_id": 47615267, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47615267", "by": "streetfighter64", "date": "2026-04-02", "stance": "warn", "quote": "they don't even offer a demo without logging in", "excerpt": "fingerprint.com seems to be some fingerprinting vendor, they don't even offer a demo without logging in. https://coveryourtracks.eff.org is EFFs demo site is non-profit and doesn't require login", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "LinkedIn Is Illegally Searching Your Computer"}]}], "who": [], "tags": [], "use_cases": ["testing browser fingerprinting", "browser fingerprinting demo"], "compared": [], "makers": [], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47613981", "title": "LinkedIn Is Illegally Searching Your Computer", "mentions": 3}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48062178", "title": "A web page that shows you everything the browser told it without asking", "mentions": 2}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50048642", "title": "Fingerprints are the new cookies", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48324910", "title": "CAPTCHAs can still detect AI agents", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46517654", "title": "Show HN: DevicePrint \u2013 device fingerprinting without cookies", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46016249", "title": "The privacy nightmare of browser fingerprinting", "mentions": 1}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {"recommend": 1}, "2025-12": {}, "2026-01": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-02": {}, "2026-03": {}, "2026-04": {"warn": 1, "neutral": 1}, "2026-05": {"recommend": 2}, "2026-06": {}, "2026-07": {}, "2026-08": {}, "2026-09": {}, "2026-10": {"recommend": 1}}, "quotes": [{"id": 800800912, "item_id": 50050057, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50050057", "by": "nilslindemann", "date": "2026-10-12", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Test with https://fingerprint.com/.", "excerpt": "I have experienced the same with Google and with PayPal, whenever I used Tor. When I afterwards visited those sites using my normal browser I got Captchas. They are actively fighting attempts to avoid fingerprinting. Also, I am pretty sure that no browser protects against getting fingerprinted. Test with https://fingerprint.com/.", "context": "", "use_case": "testing browser fingerprinting", "switched_from": "", "story": "Fingerprints are the new cookies"}, {"id": 773226561, "item_id": 48326660, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48326660", "by": "Cider9986", "date": "2026-05-29", "stance": "warn", "quote": "gives you +3 suspicious score just for using privacy settings like adblock", "excerpt": "CAPTCHAs are great. Exploiters get around them with proprietary anti-detect browsers and unethical residential proxies, while privacy browsers and affordable privacy VPNs get blocked and shadowbanned to death. Fingerprint.com, while not a CAPTCHA, gives you +3 suspicious score just for using privacy settings like adblock on your browser. This makes it harder to sign up for any sites that use fingerprint.com. https://", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "CAPTCHAs can still detect AI agents"}, {"id": 769080656, "item_id": 48067541, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48067541", "by": "shimman", "date": "2026-05-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "their JS lib doing this is quite good", "excerpt": "Don't know about easy but their JS lib doing this is quite good: https://github.com/fingerprintjs/fingerprintjs Honestly surprised to see it licensed as MIT now too. It was something less permissive before. They aren't doing anything too crazy, more like being the first ones to be open about it. I couldn't imagine what else companies like Google or Meta or TikTok can extract out of it that no one else can't. Integrat", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "A web page that shows you everything the browser told it without asking"}, {"id": 769041792, "item_id": 48065112, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48065112", "by": "Cider9986", "date": "2026-05-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I prefer https://fingerprint.com/demo", "excerpt": "I prefer https://fingerprint.com/demo Terrible company-at least you know you are testing what is being used.", "context": "", "use_case": "Browser fingerprinting demo", "switched_from": "", "story": "A web page that shows you everything the browser told it without asking"}, {"id": 761947713, "item_id": 47621732, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47621732", "by": "varenc", "date": "2026-04-02", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "fingerprintjs.com has been around for well more than a couple years", "excerpt": "> A few years ago, intentionally fingerprinting or tracking your users without disclosure was spyware and unethical. Alas, here we are. For over 15 years reCAPTCHA has relied on browser fingerprinting to help distinguish humans from bots. And fingerprintjs.com has been around for well more than a couple years. That said, sniffing the browser extensions someone is using is NOT a common fingerprinting method used by my", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "LinkedIn Is Illegally Searching Your Computer"}, {"id": 761947714, "item_id": 47621732, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47621732", "by": "varenc", "date": "2026-04-02", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I like this demo for testing my browser's resilence against fingerprinting", "excerpt": "> A few years ago, intentionally fingerprinting or tracking your users without disclosure was spyware and unethical. Alas, here we are. For over 15 years reCAPTCHA has relied on browser fingerprinting to help distinguish humans from bots. And fingerprintjs.com has been around for well more than a couple years. That said, sniffing the browser extensions someone is using is NOT a common fingerprinting method used by my", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "LinkedIn Is Illegally Searching Your Computer"}, {"id": 761844272, "item_id": 47615267, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47615267", "by": "streetfighter64", "date": "2026-04-02", "stance": "warn", "quote": "they don't even offer a demo without logging in", "excerpt": "fingerprint.com seems to be some fingerprinting vendor, they don't even offer a demo without logging in. https://coveryourtracks.eff.org is EFFs demo site is non-profit and doesn't require login", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "LinkedIn Is Illegally Searching Your Computer"}, {"id": 745397872, "item_id": 46587367, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46587367", "by": "alexcroox", "date": "2026-01-12", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "This open source one does work between incognito and normal session", "excerpt": "It shows I've visited twice already, from different countries, IPs and browsers. I don't think this works. This open source one does work between incognito and normal session: https://fingerprintjs.github.io/fingerprintjs/", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: DevicePrint \u2013 device fingerprinting without cookies"}, {"id": 736285074, "item_id": 46017817, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46017817", "by": "armadyl", "date": "2025-11-22", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I always point people to https://fingerprint.com/ to see if their browser can defeat it.", "excerpt": "The Tor Browser won\u2019t effectively stop fingerprinting, if anything it makes you more unique due to the low amount of people worldwide using it, and then you add points of data by using different DNS providers, extensions etc. The Tor Browser as a privacy measure is likely no better than a normal browser with uBlock if you\u2019re also using it like a \u201cnormal\u201d browser, signing into the same accounts you always use etc. My ", "context": "", "use_case": "testing browser fingerprinting", "switched_from": "", "story": "The privacy nightmare of browser fingerprinting"}]}