Website opens a hundred tabs to build fake advertising profiles

Mozilla has built a website that allows the browser to open a hundred tabs at once in order to mislead advertisers. Because thousands of trackers are loaded on one specific topic, ad networks build up wrong profiles.

The website is called trackthis.link and can be used in any browser. On the website, visitors can choose a fictitious profile, such as that of an influencer, a ‘doomsday prepper’ or a millionaire. After a user chooses a profile, the browser opens a hundred tabs of websites related to it. For example, if you choose the profile of a millionaire, you will be presented with websites about credit cards, private planes or tailor-made suits. Influencers mainly get to see social networks and photo cameras.

The website works on any browser, but on Firefox there are some limitations. That browser has restrictions that allow only 20 tabs to be opened at a time and only after users have given permission. On other browsers, it’s about a hundred tabs.

The website was created by the team behind Firefox. The site is a nod to how advertisers use tracking cookies to track internet users. If many websites are opened at the same time, hundreds or even thousands of such trackers also load, causing advertisers to build a different profile of users than they actually have. The makers warn users to be very sure that they really want to open all tabs: “A hundred tabs is a lot.”