Google Chrome lacks browser fingerprinting defenses

Google Chrome lacks browser fingerprinting defenses

By Thomas Claburn
Publication Date: 2026-04-16 00:28:00

Google markets its Chrome browser by citing its superior safety features, but according to privacy consultant Alexander Hanff, Chrome does not protect against browser fingerprinting – a method of tracking people online by capturing technical details about their browser.

“There are at least thirty distinct fingerprinting techniques that work in Chrome right now, today, as you read this,” wrote Hanff, an occasional contributor to The Register, in a recently published critique of Google’s browser.

“Not theoretical attacks from academic papers that might work under laboratory conditions – real, production techniques deployed on millions of websites to identify and track you without your knowledge or consent.”

Visitors to websites can leave behind a browser fingerprint that records the OS they are running, their screen resolution, and installed fonts. That info is carried in traffic from a browser to a web…