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Twitch knows which tab is opened and on top?

jwhite8055
jwhite8055
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Recently Twitch and WarGaming, as well as other advertisers, collaborated on "Twitch drops" Somehow, Twitch is able to determine which tab is on top and being viewed by visitors to the website. It's one thing for Twitch to know I'm visiting the website, and quite another for them to determine if in fact the tab I have open is front and center. Seems to me this is a privacy issue that needs to be addressed.? (I have not yet determined if this Twitch snooping is working in private tabs yet, but I soon will)

Recently Twitch and WarGaming, as well as other advertisers, collaborated on "Twitch drops" Somehow, Twitch is able to determine which tab is on top and being viewed by visitors to the website. It's one thing for Twitch to know I'm visiting the website, and quite another for them to determine if in fact the tab I have open is front and center. Seems to me this is a privacy issue that needs to be addressed.? (I have not yet determined if this Twitch snooping is working in private tabs yet, but I soon will)

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jscher2000 - Support Volunteer
jscher2000 - Support Volunteer
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There is are some standard web APIs and JavaScript events that sites can use to know when you left the page for another window or tab. For example, there's one hotel booking site that freaks out every time I go to look at something else. Some sites also pause video when it's in the background.

There are add-ons that can disable some of these features, but I don't know whether there is a comprehensive solution. One of the reviewers on this add-on mentioned success on Twitch, but I haven't tried it myself:

https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/addon/always-visible/