Active Disassociation of Hyperlink Data

Web-based randomized traffic generator: Start ADHD

Usage

Click the start button to start generating random searches. The first time you click it, a new browser tab will open. Just ignore that tab -- don't close it and don't bother clicking on any links. Just let it run in the background.

As long as the code is running, it will generate a new search every 12-24 seconds.

To stop the script, click the button again.

About

On March 28, 2017, Congress authorized S.J.Res.34. This joint resolution permits Internet Service Providers (ISPs) to track and sell your personal information.

While companies like Google and Facebook have been able to do this for years, they are limited to network traffic that reaches their servers. In contrast, your Internet provider has the capability of collecting data related to all of your online activities. Moreover, they can collect and sell this data to third-parties. The buyers could be advertisers or government entities.

Although lawmakers have suggested that users should have the option to opt-out of data collection, there is no requirement for ISPs to offer any opt-out mechanism.

Solution

In response to this permitted collection method, a user named "slifty" created Internet Noise. This script opens a tab and loads web pages based on random search queries.

• Someone watching your search queries (like your ISP) will see a variety of random web pages.
• Advertisers who buy your data will not be able to identify your interests or target you with specific ads. (Expect random ads.)
• If you use a VPN or TOR, then someone watching will see random traffic. (Mitigates the risk from traffic analysis attacks.)
• Someone viewing your browser history will see lots of random web sites.
• By using Google's "I'm Feeling Lucky" search option (which takes you to the first good match), HTTP web traffic is generated for a specific, randomly selected topic -- and it doesn't look like it came from this script.

ADHD is based on siftly's work. The key differences between this code and the original code:

• The original code only searched using Google's "I'm Feeling Lucky". This version randomly switches between Google and DuckDuckGo.
• The original code included a Google tracker (which kind of defeats the purpose); this code doesn't.
• The original code had a bug in which the setTimeout loop never terminated. I've fixed that.
• The original code was dependent on jquery. However, loading resources from other sites permits tracking. This code is in basic JavaScript; it uses no jquery and no external dependencies.
• The original code only performed two-word searches. (Well, some 'words' were two-word phrases.) This code usually searches for two words, but may search for up to 3 words. This permits a wider variety of searches.
• I've updated the original word list. The original list excluded some of the most common search words. And it included some words that would likely result in pornographic search results.
• The original code never showed you the query being performed. This code shows you the query, search engine, and how long until the next search.

Limitations

This web-based noise generator does not make you "secure" online. It only adds chaff to anyone monitoring your traffic. In effect, it raises the noise level. This should confuse basic advertiser databases since they cannot determine your actual interests.

Most modern advertisers and data aggregators will have trouble tracking user interests. However, companies that process 'big data' will likely be able to filter out this noise and identify your real traffic patterns. (Fortunately, most data aggregators don't do this.)

Other limitations:

• Searches are performed using random words. There is a slim possibility that the search result may return content that is not workplace safe. You are responsible for the use of this tool; not me. If you are not willing to accept the risk, then don't use this tool.
• Some results may contain audio (e.g., YouTube videos). You may want to mute your audio while using this tool.
• The initial search sets the HTTP referer to this page. If someone is watching the network, they will see the Referer. However, because Google and DuckDuckGo both use HTTPS, the ISP will not see this information; only Google and DuckDuckGo will know.
• Some random links may attempt to download content. Don't accept any downloads. To limit potentially hostile downloads, consider running the NoScript browser extension for Firefox, or ScriptSafe for Chrome.
• Search engines, like Google, will attempt to personalize your search results based on your geolocation and previous searches. For example, if you search for "map" or "weather", then Google will show you results based on your network address's geolocation. And if you repeatedly look for words related to a topic, then searches may return results and ads with a preference toward the topic. Although this won't stop geolocation results, enough random searches should create random topic results for you.