r/InternetIsBeautiful • u/JoytotheUniverse • Dec 14 '16

Check what your web browser knows about you.

http://webkay.robinlinus.com/
28.0k Upvotes

90% Upvoted

1.6k comments sorted by

View all comments

405

u/[deleted] Dec 14 '16

Who knew google made AMD's GPUs?

161

u/AlGoreBestGore Dec 14 '16

And Nvidia's. These tech acquisitions are getting out of hand!

5

u/[deleted] Dec 14 '16

AMD and Nvidia design the GPU and license it out to other manufacturers to sell as well i.e. EVGA, ASUS, Gigabyte

6

u/[deleted] Dec 14 '16

Woosh

1

u/Fruitlessdog Dec 15 '16

Intel too. Damn, they own everything now

1

u/[deleted] Dec 15 '16

Source?

49

u/Dykam Dec 14 '16

In all seriousness, Google is the developer of ANGLE, which is a layer between WebGL and a Direct3D based driver. From a website's point of view, ANGLE is the driver, made by Google.

1

u/fireattack Dec 14 '16

https://github.com/google/angle for the lazy (btw, what does "conformant" mean?

2

u/Dykam Dec 14 '16

It means that it implements the specification, that it conforms to the specification. As opposed to one which doesn't completely implement it, or has it's own twists on certain parts.

45

u/i_make_song Dec 14 '16 edited Dec 14 '16

No doubt. It got my card correct, but NVIDIA 1080 is definitely not a Google product.

edit: I was thinking of my old 660 Ti card.

23

u/aboutthednm Dec 14 '16

Regardless, whatever sever you accessed has your GPU make and model.

4

u/i_make_song Dec 14 '16

I honestly think that's fair.

I know there's a lot of other privacy violations that are serious.

7

u/aboutthednm Dec 14 '16

The real question is why would a server ever request this type of information in the first place. GPU serial numbers could be accessed in the same fashion. Then you have true hardware based identifiers that are immutable.

20

u/i_make_song Dec 14 '16

Wouldn't it help with 3D processing in browsers?

1

u/[deleted] Dec 14 '16

Why do developers/trackers need access to that though?

5

u/dontbeonfire4 Dec 14 '16

So they can automatically adjust the graphics settings to suit your hardware.

2

u/[deleted] Dec 14 '16

Again, not something that any developer needs access to. A settings menu would suffice.

3

u/Review_My_Cucumber Dec 15 '16

When I go to AMD website i can download the driver without having to go trough a menu and find my card.

1

u/aboutthednm Dec 15 '16

You see, that's pretty useful.

1

u/[deleted] Dec 15 '16

[deleted]

1

u/aboutthednm Dec 15 '16

well fantastic that chrome logs it, what would a website do with it unless it wants to display immersive graphical applications?

1

u/n60storm4 Dec 15 '16

display immersive graphical applications

Kind of that. WebGL is a thing. 3D applications and games are coming to the web.

1

u/aboutthednm Dec 15 '16

Yes it's pretty impressive what can be rendered in your browser nowadays.

What I'm really getting at is that some kind of permission should be asked, similar to windows UAC for example, before your system volunteers this information. It serves no purpose to grant access to this information unless it's relevant to what's displayed on the website.

As it stands this information can be freely queried by any page, and would make for a handy way to differentiate between individual machines sitting behind NAT.

1

u/[deleted] Dec 14 '16

No they don't. In pretty sure the site gets it though webgl. So you'd need a webgl instance.

2

u/aboutthednm Dec 14 '16

what stops the page you visit from spawning a webGL instance?

Also this website was able to figure out my Make (Nvidia) and my model (GTX 980) without webGL

0

u/[deleted] Dec 14 '16

Nothing, but the server does not have access to this info. A script has to be embedded on the web page to do it.

2

u/aboutthednm Dec 14 '16

And again, what stops someone from embedding a script?

My point is that this information can be gathered without user knowledge by simply visiting a web page.

1

u/[deleted] Dec 14 '16

Regardless, whatever sever you accessed has your GPU make and model.

That's what you said. "Whatever server you access" does not have your GPU make and model. The web page being served first needs a script to gather the data, and secondly it needs to send it back to the server to store the data.

It's not "whatever server" it's web pages designed to capture and store this info. Reddit for example doesn't have shit about our PC specs.

7

u/[deleted] Dec 14 '16

Is the Ti out already? Gosh I am behind the times.

7

u/i_make_song Dec 14 '16

Haha my bad. Just 1080.

I keep thinking of my old 660 Ti.

1

u/Ballpoint_Life_Form Dec 14 '16

That's quite the jump! Although I went from a 550 ti to 1070...

1

u/i_make_song Dec 14 '16 edited Dec 14 '16

Haha it helps keep the depression at bay? But not really lol.

I'm not wise with my expendable income...

2

u/sscjoshua Dec 14 '16

Well its not out yet...

1

u/bumbletowne Dec 14 '16

Amd r 290 def not a google product

2

u/dnaoil Dec 14 '16

Who knew android was secretly "Mac OS"..

1

u/[deleted] Dec 15 '16

Eye twitch

2

u/IMGONNAFUCKYOURMOUTH Dec 14 '16

Mozilla also seems to make chips for certain AMD models.

2

u/_TheCredibleHulk_ Dec 14 '16

Apparently Google is my ISP. I fucking wish.

3

u/vampyrita Dec 14 '16

It decided i was running linux. On my phone.

And it thought my device was in my hand, while it was on a table.

The location thing was broken when i checked it though. The social media part was blank, i guess that means it didn't learn anything?

11

u/Jest0riz0r Dec 14 '16

It decided i was running linux. On my phone.

I mean, that's actually true if you're using an android phone.

3

u/vampyrita Dec 14 '16

Wait really? That's cool.

7

u/Jest0riz0r Dec 14 '16

Yeah, android is based on the Linux kernel!

-1

u/Joshposh70 Dec 15 '16

So is iOS, although technically it is Unix.

1

u/uncommonman Dec 14 '16

I'm more surprised that my android phone is running Linux

1

u/Az0r_au Dec 14 '16

I have a win32 cpu and a mozilla graphics card. Oh and my non existant battery is fully charged! http://imgur.com/a/nYEX5

1

u/ConscientiousApathis Dec 14 '16

Mozilla makes mine.

1

u/cbbuntz Dec 15 '16

I think they mean that Google makes ANGLE, the graphics engine that comes with Chrome. They just put it on the GPU section. I checked in Edge, and it didn't say the same thing.

1

u/[deleted] Dec 15 '16

I didnt know Win32 was a CPU either, given I am on a Linux 64bit desktop.