jonny on Nostr: More fun publisher surveillance: Elsevier embeds a hash in the PDF metadata that is ...
More fun publisher surveillance:
Elsevier embeds a hash in the PDF metadata that is *unique for each time a PDF is downloaded*, this is a diff between metadata from two of the same paper. Combined with access timestamps, they can uniquely identify the source of any shared PDFs.
Published at
2022-01-25 23:36:27Event JSON
{
"id": "3692379a0f1c70c165e112cb0fb61910f0006126381fe1caaa6d616a03fb031f",
"pubkey": "038d795229013f27e4db775bd31b4ee3f1b5d3b68cf7263d11b3e5714f3b522d",
"created_at": 1643153787,
"kind": 1,
"tags": [
[
"proxy",
"https://social.coop/users/jonny/statuses/107685726645817029",
"activitypub"
]
],
"content": "More fun publisher surveillance:\nElsevier embeds a hash in the PDF metadata that is *unique for each time a PDF is downloaded*, this is a diff between metadata from two of the same paper. Combined with access timestamps, they can uniquely identify the source of any shared PDFs.\n\nhttps://social-coop-media.ams3.cdn.digitaloceanspaces.com/media_attachments/files/107/685/726/594/579/059/original/053de9506bb007c6.jpg",
"sig": "4be2e3edba70e35d046aab324333e9e3f0b7515cad750fedf1b14f7130d8a71a2c3a729670ab81b5b81908fbfb8acb13812ae54435edc37fa4059d797236fb39"
}