self-regulate under AdChoices

[chadwhitacre]

was: get unblocked by Ghostery

---

@coderanger reports that https://www.ghostery.com/apps/gittip.

I haven't heard of Ghostery before. What does this mean? What should we do?

Did you help close this issue? Go claim the $9 bounty on Bountysource.

[coderanger]

Screenshot from firefox http://i.coderanger.net/hYmDL.png

[chadwhitacre]

I've reached out on Twitter:

https://twitter.com/whit537/status/400770908916162561

[chadwhitacre]

Screenshot, inlined:

[jdan]

It's because of the Gittip button, Chad. In the context of a Facebook "Like" button: if you are logged into Facebook and see that button on, let's say, a CNN article, Facebook can see what you are reading. It can then use this information to serve you better ads, recommend pages, all sorts of stuff.

I'm not sure what data Gittip gets from views of this button - I imagine it's just analytics stuff. But Ghostery is a tool that allows you to see the trackers on any given website, what data they collect, and also gives users to ability to block them.

I encourage you to check it out: http://www.ghostery.com

[seanlinsley]

@whit537 what's the context to that screenshot? I'm particularly worried about the "redirect from github to gittip" part

[coderanger]

@seanlinsley That was because I was doing a github oauth login at the time.

[seanlinsley]

☑️

[chadwhitacre]

What is the action item for Gittip here?

[coderanger]

@whit537 I think one thing is to make a formal policy about data retention for all logs and other info related to the buttons/shields.

[chadwhitacre]

Reticketed as #1670. See also: #397.

[chadwhitacre]

+1 from @suizilla on Twitter.

[chadwhitacre]

I'm dropping this from IRQ. If someone wants to tackle it, feel free.

[chadwhitacre]

+1 from @bmispelon on #1689 / #1690.

[abnor]

As suggested at the Gittip retreat: email them our Terms of Service to show that we are a real company.

[duckinator]

We are not blocked by Ghostery. https://www.ghostery.com/apps/gittip

[abnor]

Working on the Ghostery issue, the image posted above doesn't make sense since there is no google analytics on github which is the redirect that is being blocked. Having installed Ghostery on Chrome and then testing our current buttons from Duck's personal webpage, the page still redirects, however the google analytics tool is blocked, and that is the only thing that happens.

tl;dr ?!?!?!?!??!?!!

[rummik]

I can't confirm this either. I installed Ghostery, and wasn't able to find anywhere that we're blocked

[duckinator]

Logging in via Github OAuth works from Gittip, with Ghostery installed. I don't know of anywhere else where Github would be redirecting to us.

[rummik]

@coderanger Can you follow up on this and tell us exactly where we're blocked? Ghostery lists us as a company, but I don't think that means anything beyond that.

[coderanger]

I no longer use Ghostery, so not at the moment. The issue was during login via Github, the direct from github back to gittip was blocked in Firefox by the Ghostery extension.

[zbynekwinkler]

I use Ghostery and it reports that it has found the following files, that would have been blocked had I not whitelisted it:

Detected tracker source URLs:
https://www.gittip.com/assets/reset.css
https://www.gittip.com/assets/chosen/chosen.jquery.min.js
https://www.gittip.com/assets/chosen/chosen.css
https://www.gittip.com/assets/11.1.1/vendor/bootstrap-dropdown.js
https://www.gittip.com/assets/11.1.1/utils.js
https://www.gittip.com/assets/11.1.1/logo.png
https://www.gittip.com/assets/icons/twitter.16.png
https://www.gittip.com/assets/11.1.1/avatar-default.gif

[abnor]

That is helpful. Thanks @zwn I think the issue is done though :D Yay~ We'll still make a static button for all other websites and blockers tho, right @duckinator ?

[zbynekwinkler]

I don't think it is time to close it. The way ghostery works is that by default it just lists all things it considers trackers (or privacy offenders) on visited sites. But most people just check the option to block all these. When you do this, not only our buttons are blocked but also the main site breaks (because all files listed above a blocked).

@rummik seemed interested in talking to them because it does not make any sense to block our own files on our own site.

[rummik]

Yeah, I'm reopening so I remember to follow up on bugging Ghostery.

[clone1018]

I can see what it's blocking but not why.

[chadwhitacre]

+1 from @timo on Twitter.

[chadwhitacre]

@jpcaissy had trouble with Ghostery and the credit card form over on #2372.

[techtonik]

Closing as there is no gittip anymore. When there will be a problem with gratipay please open a new ticket.

[chadwhitacre]

Received in private personal email from []@ghostery.com:

We're writing to you because you are in our vendor privacy database as a company who provides 3rd party technology on websites. The Digital Advertising Alliance's Self-Regulatory Program encourages such companies to provide direct and functioning opt-outs, however, you do not currently provide one.

As one of the approved AdChoices Icon providers under the Program, Ghostery helps companies navigate the self-regulatory "AdChoices" programs in the US, EU and Canada and therefore ask that you contact us with an opt-out script or the contact information of the right person within your company on this issue.

Thank you for your attention to this important matter.

[chadwhitacre]

I replied:

Thanks for getting in touch, []. Do you use GitHub? We are an open organization and we have a ticket about this issue:

#1669

You'd be welcome to weigh in there, or you can follow up with [email protected] to help us navigate this process.

Thanks!

[chadwhitacre]

(Also received on [email protected].)

[jwheeler66]

Hello:
My name is Jeff W. I work at Ghostery. I was forwarded the email whit537 was referring. I wanted to reach out and make sure you guys were taken care of. I see you have some concerns regarding whats being blocked by Ghostery on your pages. Is their anymore insight you can give me on this?

Jeff

[chadwhitacre]

Thanks @jwheeler66. In the email quoted above we were asked to "contact [Ghostery] with an opt-out script." What's an "opt-out script" in this context?

[jwheeler66]

An opt-out script is a way for a user to opt-out of being tracked if the said company engages in that. Its a cookie thats usually dropped on a browser telling the company now to track said user. You can learn more about it here: http://www.aboutads.info/

[chadwhitacre]

Thanks @jwheeler66, I've started looking into this, and I've retitled this ticket "self-regulate under AdChoices." We do very little in the way of ads at the moment, and I'm fairly sure we don't track. I'm going to leave this open for down the road when we start doing more of that again.

[jwheeler66]

@whit537 great thanks. Do you still need help with whats being blocked on your site?

[chadwhitacre]

Do you still need help with whats being blocked on your site?

If it's obvious to you then we'l be grateful for the input. Otherwise I'm happy to defer this until it's higher priority for us.

[jwheeler66]

I should emphasize for the extension Ghostery is NOT just an Ad-blocker but 3rd party tags. Right now our extension for Gittip blocks anything with gittip.com in the pather. To me this appears to vauge and will block to much on your site. I noticed you had a widget, this is something we would normally block. I found the path for this as (netdna-ssl.net/js/gittip-widget.js). Is their anything else?

[chadwhitacre]

Ah, okay. Our widgets are in a bit of a broken state right now. I've added this to our "Finish Team Basics" milestone. Let's circle back when that's further along ...

[chadwhitacre]

Actually, this really belongs under Make Widgets 2.0, but that's in a different repo and milestones are repo-bound in GitHub (I just mailed support to ask for supra-repo milestones). I've added a stub over there at gratipay/grtp.co#150, and I'm bumping this off the Finish Team Basics milestone.

[chadwhitacre]

Received in private mail:

Hi there.

On Feb 1, 2017 the Digital Advertising Association (DAA) along with the Council of Better Business Bureaus (CBBB) will start enforcing their cross device data policies. Click Here for Details
To help communicate to consumers which companies are engaging in cross device tracking we will display a Cross Device category with vendors engaged in this activity on our opt-out/opt-in pages.

If your company builds a device graph to better target ad campaigns and marketing activities, please let us know so we can update our company records accordingly. If you can include the name of your company within your reply, that would be greatly appreciated as it will help us navigate our records.

Please make sure you include the name of your company in your response to make it easier for us to locate your records.

Sincerely,
Your Friends at Ghostery

[chadwhitacre]

Closing in light of our decision to shut down Gratipay.

Thank you all for a great run, and I'm sorry it didn't work out! 😞 💃