Cookies vs Fingerprinting vs AnonView: How to Measure Without PII

Cookies store identifiers in the browser. Fingerprinting infers identity by combining device signals. Both can trigger consent requirements.

Fingerprinting is especially risky because it is hard to explain and harder to control. Regulators treat it as a form of covert tracking.

A privacy-first analytics program should avoid both. The goal is to measure behavior without identifying people.

Fingerprinting works by combining signals like screen size, fonts, and device timing. Even if you do not store the raw data, the combined signal can still identify a person.

That identification risk makes it hard to justify under GDPR and ePrivacy unless you can prove a strict exemption.

AnonView captures only semantic events and safe metadata: page path, referrer domain, and intent score. No cookies, no fingerprinting.

{
  "event_type": "conversion_start",
  "path": "/checkout",
  "referrer_domain": "search",
  "intent_score": 72,
  "session_hash": "rotating_daily_hash"
}

• State explicitly that no personal identifiers are collected.
• Document daily session rotation and URL sanitization.
• Keep a retention policy that matches your analytics needs.