Smartphone fingerprint

Motherboard (May 31) -- Recent research has pointed to a method of device fingerprinting that uses the minuscule, unique imperfections in each phone’s accelerometer and gyroscope to create a profile of that phone that can be used to track its user’s activities across the web, without the user’s knowledge. “Smartphone users who use private browsing or clear their cookies to avoid tracking would find that these protection measures are rendered ineffective by fingerprinting, and they can still be tracked,” says Nikita Borisov, a professor of electrical and computer engineering at Illinois.