Internet hosts use a variety of:
- personal data (including your online behavior) gathering
- non-personal data gathering such as device data
in order to keep track of you.
Take a look at the Tunnelbear VPN Privacy Policy:
https://www.tunnelbear.com/privacy-policy
That explains clearly, what an Internet host gathers.
T-Mobile also explains clearly:
https://www.t-mobile.com/privacy-center/our-practices/privacy-policy
Such Privacy Policies are lengthy, but those two Internet hosts spell out the details.
The mating of your
- personal data (including your online behavior)
- non-personal data such as device data
happens, because the Internet host can do that, and there are an abundance of other Internet hosts and services that work at making the connections between you and, again, your
- personal data (including your online behavior)
- non-personal data such as device data.
That matching and mating of data, is a special skill of Google (and others, including governments (including proxies used by governments)).
So, when an Internet host says that they do not keep track of you . . . they can and they do.
When the Internet host says that they do not store “your personal data,” that may be true; but again, they can and often do know where you have been on the Internet.
VPN services do know where you have been.
Internet hosts and services can know what you transmit - when that transmitted data is not encrypted.
In general, most Internet users seek convenience much more than the work required to make some significant effort at personal privacy.
Free e-mail services, cost you and everybody with whom you communicate.
Specifically, browser fingerprinting. I tested with Safari using https://coveryourtracks.eff.org/. It says "Protecting you from fingerprinting? Your browser has a unique fingerprint"
I tested with Brave using the same URL. It says
Blocking tracking ads? Partial protection
Blocking invisible trackers? Partial protection
Unblocking 3rd parties that honor Do Not Track? No
Protecting you from fingerprinting? " your browser has a randomized fingerprint"
I probably need to configure Brave better. However I will bet FR donation money that the browser fingerprint survives any VPN. The VPN has no idea if the browser is being fingerprinted or not. If somone has a VPN and can run the test please let me know so I can send a donation if I am wrong.