InformAction Forums

When NoScript is installed, the Do Not Track browser preference is ignored and do not track is always enabled. This is confusing to the user since one expects if do not track is turned off, it should actually be off. Yes the user can go and change the noscript.doNotTrack.enabled preference to false and then can control the do not track preference in the browser, but that shouldn't be necessary, especially since other than an old blog post there's no indication that NoScript is overriding the browser setting.

Since Do Not Track functionality has been added to almost every browser out there, there's really no reason to have NoScript handle this, but if it must it should at least obey the browser setting.

Morac wrote:When NoScript is installed, the Do Not Track browser preference is ignored and do not track is always enabled. This is confusing to the user since one expects if do not track is turned off, it should actually be off. Yes the user can go and change the noscript.doNotTrack.enabled preference to false and then can control the do not track preference in the browser, but that shouldn't be necessary, especially since other than an old blog post there's no indication that NoScript is overriding the browser setting.

Since Do Not Track functionality has been added to almost every browser out there, there's really no reason to have NoScript handle this, but if it must it should at least obey the browser setting.

I understand your point, and agree with it, to some degree.

Giorgio Maone has promised to maintain back-compatibility with Fx 3.6.28 (last version of Fx 3) until its usage goes below 5%.
Fx 3 did not have its own support for DNT, so NoScript added the option, then turned it on by default. Turning it off by default removes this protection for users of F3 who are not aware of the feature.

So the issue is self-limiting in time: When NS support for F3 ends, then it does seem that NS could drop this feature.

IDK how complex it would be to have NS on F12+ automatically follow the browser preference, but it is worth asking Giorgio, which I will do.
Alternatively, it could be returned to the NS GUI, where it first appeared, IIRC.

I am curious: Why do you *want* sites to track you?

On a side note, I'm a bit conflicted about removing NoScript's DNT functionality because it provides a finer grained control (through the noscript.doNotTrack.exceptions and noscript.doNotTrack.forced about:config preference) which may be useful in your use case, for instance.

When the blog post you're mentioning was written, there was no "browser setting" there, but it was quite clear that NoScript users would have DNT enabled by default unless they changed NoScript's preference. Furthermore, it's quite difficult to keep consistency with the expectation I set when I first released this feature (if you install NoScript, you're sending DNT) and obeying the browser setting, since the latter is disabled by default.

Giorgio Maone wrote: When the blog post you're mentioning was written, there was no "browser setting" there, but it was quite clear that NoScript users would have DNT enabled by default unless they changed NoScript's preference. Furthermore, it's quite difficult to keep consistency with the expectation I set when I first released this feature (if you install NoScript, you're sending DNT) and obeying the browser setting, since the latter is disabled by default.

How about having NoScript set the browser setting to 'enabled' when it's installed, and then following the browser setting afterward?

Thrawn wrote:

Giorgio Maone wrote: When the blog post you're mentioning was written, there was no "browser setting" there, but it was quite clear that NoScript users would have DNT enabled by default unless they changed NoScript's preference. Furthermore, it's quite difficult to keep consistency with the expectation I set when I first released this feature (if you install NoScript, you're sending DNT) and obeying the browser setting, since the latter is disabled by default.

How about having NoScript set the browser setting to 'enabled' when it's installed, and then following the browser setting afterward?

The problem with this approach is that if user enables the browser settings, exceptions and forced sites don't work (because Firefox always adds the header no matter what).

Giorgio Maone wrote:On a side note, I'm a bit conflicted about removing NoScript's DNT functionality because it provides a finer grained control (through the noscript.doNotTrack.exceptions and noscript.doNotTrack.forced about:config preference) which may be useful in your use case, for instance.

When the blog post you're mentioning was written, there was no "browser setting" there, but it was quite clear that NoScript users would have DNT enabled by default unless they changed NoScript's preference. Furthermore, it's quite difficult to keep consistency with the expectation I set when I first released this feature (if you install NoScript, you're sending DNT) and obeying the browser setting, since the latter is disabled by default.

I agree. Thanks for pointing out the finer control available in NS vs. Fx. And I had forgotten that Fx default-disables DNT.

I withdraw support for any change.


@ Giorgio: I could find no mention of DNT in either the NoScript FAQ or the NoScript "Features Page", unless I'm missing something.
Wouldn't it be a good idea to add this to one or both (preferably both)? As OP points out, users who disable DNT in Fx (still can't imagine *why*) would be puzzled to discover that DNT is still being sent. I'm sure blog followers make up a very small percentage of NS users, no?

Please consider doing this. Thanks.