Lately I’ve noticed some mainstream sites injection tracking links into literally every link on their site.

When I hover over it, it shows the correct link at the bottom of my browser, but if I click it or copy it, it takes me to a hijacked tracker link.

Then I can’t even get the original link without having my activity tracked.

How do I get the original link that appears at the bottom of my browser?

  • Tippon@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    11 months ago

    There’s an extension for Firefox and maybe Chrome that should help. I think it’s called ClearURL, or something similar. It removes the trackers from the ends of URLs

    EDIT: That’s assuming that it’s a legitimate tracking URL, and not something that’s been added by malware.

      • F_Haxhausen@lemmy.world
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        11 months ago

        Maybe don’t use Facebook or any other site that does this?

        I’ve been told this is an unreasonable solution.

      • Tippon@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        11 months ago

        That sounds more like malware then. Links from Twitter shouldn’t have any Facebook tracking info.

        Check your browser for any extensions that you don’t recognise, and if you’re on Windows, download and run the free version of Malwarebytes.

    • BuckShot@beehaw.org
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      11 months ago

      I don’t have an extention on FF but whenever I copy a link there’s an option to also copy clean link. I’m not home, but I believe this is associated with my search engine being SearXNG.

      • lemonuri@lemmy.ml
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        11 months ago

        This is actually a rather new feature in the firefox browser unrelated to searx.

          • Tippon@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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            11 months ago

            Vanilla.

            The only reason I didn’t mention it is because it’s for copying links, whereas the extension should do it while opening, without needing to copy it first.

            • wildginger@lemmy.myserv.one
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              11 months ago

              Thats a level of convenience that will probably get me to grab the extension, but Im glad firefox has that as a feature anyway