What does the NYT use to prevent "some" freeware browsers from reading too many of their articles for free?

On 27/01/2020 19.56, Mayayana wrote:
"Mike Easter" wrote

| The NYT doesn't allow access if the browser is in incognito or private
mode.
|

I have no trouble in New Moon masquerading as
FF70. Script disabled. Frames disabled. Extensive
HOSTS file. No 3rd-party cookies. Secret Agent
also blocks or spoofs numerous things. Cookies
deleted at browser close. I doubt the problem you
have is private mode. That only means it doesn't keep
history, cache, cookies. It doesn't imply any actual
restrictions of tracking.

I suppose it's possible that NYT is using IP address
to track. That seems like an awfully lot of work, but
I'm only seeing session cookies from their site. It's
also possible that I could be blocked if I reached their
monthly/daily limit. I don't visit NYT enough to find
out.

That plays badly on clients using CGN (Carrier Grade NAT), like my
mobile phone provider. Clients get an address in the range 10.*.*.*, so
that thousands of people are browsing with the same Internet IP.

--
Cheers, Carlos.

On Mon, 27 Jan 2020 11:20:00 -0800, Mike Easter wrote:

Their limit is down to 5/mo now.

I recently learned that possession of a/some library card/s
(school/public) provides access to their digital edition. That includes
my public library.

Hi Mike,

Thanks for that limit of 5 information, where, to help others test it more
easily, I posted to Mayayana ten links that can be clicked on in sequence.

Your idea is a great one for library access, which is often included in our
property taxes, so most people (at least most in the USA) should have easy
free library access to the digital editions of the New York Times that way.

Even better, at least in California, we can get a library card at _every_
library (almost?) in the state.

Which means, in effect, even if any one library account itself has limits,
you just switch to a _different_ library account (I do it all the time so
the grandkids can see free current movies, for example, since I don't pay
for subscriptions like Netflix).

Essentially, the fact you can have a free library card at every library in
the state means there are, essentially, no limits, at least for California
residents, although one caveat I noticed is that some libraries (e.g., San
Jose) will give the card to _anyone_, but, you have to pick up the card, in
person, and show ID at the time you pick up the card.

Realistically, that limits you to libraries you can travel to, at least
once.

Arlen Holder wrote:
Mike Easter wrote:

Their limit is down to 5/mo now.

Thanks for that limit of 5 information, where, to help others test it more
easily, I posted to Mayayana ten links that can be clicked on in sequence.

I'm not actually sure that 5 is the number 'universally' - if NYT
'favors' some access over others, then maybe 5 is the number for some
access but not all or some such.

I read an article in the NYT that said they had been tweaking their
paywall system 'aggressively', particularly this past year.

This item is 'open' ie not paywalled.

https://open.nytimes.com/we-re-launc...d-5cd1f795f76b
We Re-Launched The New York Times Paywall and No One Noticed




--
Mike Easter

On Mon, 27 Jan 2020 11:36:43 -0800, Mike Easter wrote:

I'm not actually sure that 5 is the number 'universally' - if NYT
'favors' some access over others, then maybe 5 is the number for some
access but not all or some such.

Hi Mike,

*Your information is wonderful!*

I agree with you that it's (likely) not so simple as a set number, nor a
set IP address, nor a set browser, nor a even a set of cookies, etc.

Yet, they're doing "something" tricky that we're not really cognizant of.

Sometimes it seems to be 3, and as, you noted, that can be 5, and as you
noted astutely (which is a GREAT datapoint!), that they may be using the
"referrer ID" (or whatever it's called in HTML terminology) to limit you.

As a hypothetical example of what you found out,
o Maybe, from news.google.com, they let you in 3 times
o But maybe from a direct call, they let you in 5 times
o And maybe from their competition, they let you in 7 times
whatever.

If _that_ is the case, it will be harder to reproduce without a good set of
test cases.

Or, it may depend on the browser, the IP address, the cookies, etc.

I think whatever it is they're doing, it results in an inconsistent result
for us, where someone like me has almost a score of browsers, so I have no
problem, but someone like badgolferman on that iOS newsgroup likely has
only Safari - so _he_ has a huge problem.

The problem, as I see it, is that people who can't access the NYT will lack
facts that are only reported on NYT (at least initially).

Hence, it behooves us to figure it out, or people will remain ignorant.

--
Usene is a wonderful public potluck where purposefully helpful people meet.

Arlen Holder wrote:
The problem, as I see it, is that people who can't access the NYT will lack
facts that are only reported on NYT (at least initially).

I don't consider the NYT ie The Old Lady of 43rd St (very old sobriquet)
or The Gray Lady (less so, but still old) to be the same quality news
source as in its past.

Its news is politically biased; the quality of its journalism is
'sketchy' - occasionally very good, sometimes mediocre at best.

IMO it is not a 'top flight' journalistic source, but is still capable
of winning awards sometimes.

However, I'm glad that they have been able to become profitable again,
in spite of bias, instead of crashing and burning like so many
traditional print news sources have done since the internet.

--
Mike Easter

On Mon, 27 Jan 2020 12:06:33 -0800, Mike Easter wrote:

I don't consider the NYT ie The Old Lady of 43rd St (very old sobriquet)
or The Gray Lady (less so, but still old) to be the same quality news
source as in its past.

Hi Mike,

In the case of Bezos' phone and in the Iran missile strike lies,
it does appear that two things of import occurred:
1. The NYT was the _first_ to report the in-depth details, and,
2. Days later, everyone was simply copying what the NYT reported.

Those copies referred to the NYT, so we _know_ they're copies.

For example:
/Dateline: January 21st, 2020/

o *Analysis Ties Hacking of Bezos' Phone to Saudi Leader's Account*
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/21/technology/bezos-phone-hacking.html

"Mr. Bezos and Prince Mohammed exchanged phone numbers at a dinner
in Los Angeles in April 2018. The crown prince initiated a messaging
conversation with Mr. Bezos that same day over WhatsApp.
About a month later, Mr. Bezos received an unexpected message from
the crown prince that contained a video attachment"

"The report did not say whether Mr. Bezos opened the video attachment,
which had an image of Saudi and Swedish flags overlaid with Arabic
text. But immediately after he received the file, the amount of data
exiting his phone increased almost three hundredfold, according to
the investigators' analysis of Mr. Bezos's data."

"On two later occasions...the crown prince appeared to send Mr. Bezos
messages that suggested he had knowledge of the tech mogul's private
communications."

/Dateline: January 22, 2020/
o *How Jeff Bezos' iPhone X Was Hacked*
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/22/technology/jeff-bezos-hack-iphone.html

1. Jeff Bezos received a WhatsApp text seemingly from MBS on his iPhone X.
2. It contained a video of Saudi & Swedish flags with Arabic text.
3. "Hidden in that file was a separate bit of code that most likely
implanted malware that gave attackers access to Mr. Bezos¢ entire phone"

"Cybersecurity experts said some malware did not require anyone to click on
the file for it to install on a phone."

o *How Jeff Bezos' iPhone X Was Hacked*
https://www.macobserver.com/news/how-jeff-bezos-iphone-x-was-hacked/
"The malware, sent via WhatsApp, caused data to leave the device
through apps Mr. Bezos did not appear to be using heavily. These
included *Safari* and *Mail*... Cybersecurity experts reportedly said
that the type of malware involved in the attack did not require
the victim to actively click on a link to install it."

/Dateline: January 23, 2020/
o *Jeff Bezos iPhone X hack gave full access to his photos and messages*
https://ww.9to5mac.com/2020/01/23/jeff-bezos-iphone-x/
"A forensic analysis shows that a sophisticated attack on Jeff Bezos'
iPhone X gave full access to both his photos and messages."

"The Saudi government denies any involvement, but the UN says there
is sufficient evidence to begin a criminal investigation."

Although this is dated the same day as the original NYT article:
o *Jeff Bezos hack: Amazon boss's phone hacked by Saudi crown prince*
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2020/jan/21/amazon-boss-jeff-bezoss-phone-hacked-by-saudi-crown-prince

"analysis found it 'highly probable' that the intrusion into the phone
was triggered by an infected video file sent from the account of the
Saudi heir"

"The two men had been having a seemingly friendly WhatsApp exchange
when, on 1 May of that year, the unsolicited file was sent"

"Large amounts of data were exfiltrated from Bezos¢s phone within hours"

"a forensic analysis of Bezos's phone... has been reviewed by Agnes
Callamard, the UN special rapporteur... [who] considered it credible
enough for a formal approach to Saudi Arabia to ask for an explanation"

Of course, I think the Guardian _also_ might limit access, unfortunately
(but I'd have to check a few Guardian articles to be sure).

Arlen Holder wrote:
In the case of Bezos' phone and in the Iran missile strike lies,
it does appear that two things of import occurred:
1. The NYT was the_first_ to report the in-depth details, and,
2. Days later, everyone was simply copying what the NYT reported.

Re Bezos phone;

.... 'first' reporting of a story that happened 'a long time ago' is a
strange metric to spout.

The beginnings of the investigation started in 2019 Feb and the
high-falutin' FTI investigation which provided no *real* evidence was
completed in 2019 Nov.

Much of the history is by 'recollection' and much of the conclusions is
based critical evaluation of the types of characters involved.

What the hell does the 'UN' know about invisible/magical phone hacking,
anyway? At least FTI put on a dog and pony show.

--
Mike Easter

Arlen Holder wrote:

What, technically, does the NYT use to prevent "some"
freeware browsers from reading too many of their articles
for free?

I just quickly downloaded 20 random articles from today's
NYT using an Android Firefox browser with only JavaScript
turned off. I'm not a member and there were no complaints
from the site...

"Mike Easter" wrote |

| Their limit is down to 5/mo now.

I don't visit that often. Only when they have an
exclusive I want to read, which is typically something
like an in-depth story on some tech issue.

I think disabling script also saves me from a lot of
hassles. Your link describes popups that ask you to pay
and tell you how many free articles you have left. I
never see anything like that. Looking at the source code,
there's a vast amount of script. But the actual page
content is in there, unobfuscated. The actual page, with
far too much CSS and way, way too much script, is 428 KB.
The HTML containing the text of the article is 10 KB!

I've seen an increasing number of sites that actually embed
the text in script code, as a variable, so that the page is
blank without script. But that's still not so common. The first
case I saw was forbes.com. Later they stopped doing it. I'd
be curious to know what their thinking was in each case. But
like nytimes, I just don't visit Forbes unless they're the only
source of an in-depth article.

A bigger problem I see a lot, for which I found a CSS
toggle button to put on my toolbar, is the very poorly designed
layout of most sites, which seems to be optimized for phones.
NYT articles are in a serif font, probably at least 16 px, and triple
spaced. Like reading a childrens' book. It's so awkward to read
that I disable CSS and read it as 13px Verdana with slight line
spacing.

They're using 1/2 MB of slop to customize their 10 KB webpage,
and I have to disable all of it to be able to simply read the
webpage text. What's wrong with this picture? But from watching
other people I get the sense that most people have got used to
constant harassment, with popups and popovers flying around the
screen constantly, and just don't mind it.

|
| I recently learned that possession of a/some library card/s
| (school/public) provides access to their digital edition. That includes
| my public library.
|

They probably don't care very much as long as they
can track you. It's still a "paywall" of sorts because
they'll know your personal ID and be able to track
exactly what you read, then sell that to advertisers
and data wholesalers.

There was a time when the aim was to get people
to pay, but more and more the aim is to get people
to see targetted ads.

"Carlos E.R." wrote

| That plays badly on clients using CGN (Carrier Grade NAT), like my
| mobile phone provider. Clients get an address in the range 10.*.*.*, so
| that thousands of people are browsing with the same Internet IP.
|

I wondered about that. So maybe their paywall depends
entirely on javascript being enabled. There's something both
worrisome and appealing in the thought that script might
become so pervasive that I can travel the Web safely and
easily without it, because website sleaze ends up being
designed with the assumption that no one disables script.

But that then still leaves the question of how/where they
store a visit record. Cookies? Supercookies? Web bugs?
If it's anything like that then they must not be calculating
for people who simply delete or block all those things.

Mike Easter wrote:
What the hell does the 'UN' know about invisible/magical phone hacking,
anyway?

2 UN rapporteurs speak out about the alleged phone issue as if they knew
anything.

For those who are wondering what a UN 'special rapporteur' means anyway,
there's a wp article:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United...ial_rapporteur have a
specific country or thematic mandate from the United Nations Human
Rights Council.

Sooo... long after whatever (might have) happened, JB's security dude
(and JB of course) commissions FTI which isn't really renowned for their
forensic skills to work on some kind of suspicion they developed.
Seeing as how they were paid a lot of money and had better do a good job
for those who commissioned them to say something, they went to all kind
of technical trouble to discover NO EVIDENCE, but accusing MBS anyway.

Then, because suspicions still ran high, despite that lack of evidence,
apparently JB threw his weight around to get this UN HRC pair of
'rapporteurs' to make some noise about it. When the whole idea of those
rapporteurs first arose in the UN, they weren't supposed to make public
noise, but instead report to some deliberative body, but that 'no
publicity' idea was changed along the way somehow.

So, if I'm understanding this correctly JB is anti-MBS, particularly on
such as the Khashoggi murder and of course is also anti-Trump.

JB = Jeff Bezos
MBS = Mohammed bin Salman
HRC = Human Rights Council of the UN - a place where everyone picks on
Israel instead of all of the other human rights problems of the world.

--
Mike Easter

123456789 wrote:
Arlen Holder wrote:

What, technically, does the NYT use to prevent "some"
freeware browsers from reading too many of their
articles for free?

I just quickly downloaded 20 random articles from
today's NYT using an Android Firefox browser with only
JavaScript turned off. I'm not a member and there were no
complaints from the site...

Just tried it again, this time I quickly downloaded 25 NYT
articles from today's paper using a Chromebook Chrome
browser with only JavaScript turned off. Again no problems
from the site. If one wants to routinely read this rag
without paying turning JavaScript off seems to be the key...

123456789 wrote:
I just quickly downloaded 20 random articles from today's
NYT using an Android Firefox browser with only JavaScript
turned off. I'm not a member and there were no complaints
from the site...

Confirmed; current platform MX Linux 19, Ffx 69.0.3 - no added extensions

Ffx about:config toggle javascript.enabled from true to false after
applying ffx open private window.

Opened several NYT articles in the private window which NYT had
previously refused access including refusing access to the private
window ffx.


--
Mike Easter

On 27/01/2020 23.07, Mayayana wrote:
"Carlos E.R." wrote

| That plays badly on clients using CGN (Carrier Grade NAT), like my
| mobile phone provider. Clients get an address in the range 10.*.*.*, so
| that thousands of people are browsing with the same Internet IP.
|

I wondered about that. So maybe their paywall depends
entirely on javascript being enabled. There's something both
worrisome and appealing in the thought that script might
become so pervasive that I can travel the Web safely and
easily without it, because website sleaze ends up being
designed with the assumption that no one disables script.

But that then still leaves the question of how/where they
store a visit record. Cookies? Supercookies? Web bugs?
If it's anything like that then they must not be calculating
for people who simply delete or block all those things.

Probably a combination of things with scores. Cookies of all sorts,
fingerprinting... Possibly even the IP.


--
Cheers, Carlos.

On Mon, 27 Jan 2020 12:39:50 -0800, in alt.comp.os.windows-10 you wrote:

... 'first' reporting of a story that happened 'a long time ago' is a
strange metric to spout.

Hi Mike,

We go way back, where you know I always agree when people are reasonable.

I agree with you. This particular Bezos situation goes way back, so we
really don't have a good handle on whether the NYT is reporting "new" news.

The beginnings of the investigation started in 2019 Feb and the
high-falutin' FTI investigation which provided no *real* evidence was
completed in 2019 Nov.

Fair enough. I agree. There's no good case for the NYT being "new" news.

Much of the history is by 'recollection' and much of the conclusions is
based critical evaluation of the types of characters involved.

Agreed.
Your point is valid, even as I hadn't realized it until you said it.

What the hell does the 'UN' know about invisible/magical phone hacking,
anyway? At least FTI put on a dog and pony show.

I think the advantage of the UN is that the Saudi Arabians may be forced to
make a "formal" response; but, I really don't know what the UN has to do
with it (but the articles mentioned that the UN is involved).

On Mon, 27 Jan 2020 14:11:44 -0800, Mike Easter wrote:

2 UN rapporteurs speak out about the alleged phone issue as if they knew
anything.

Like you, I didn't know what a "rapporteurs" was, until you said so below.
"The term rapporteur is a French-derived word for an investigator
who reports to a deliberative body."
o United Nations special rapporteur
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_special_rapporteur

*Where do I get me one of those _freeware_ rapporteurs anyway?*
o What are the roles of United Nations special rapporteurs?
https://www.rappler.com/newsbreak/fast-facts/197631-united-nations-special-rapporteurs-role-tasks
"Special rapporteurs work in their personal capacity
and are not considered employees by the United Nations,
*hence they do not receive any salary*"

For those who are wondering what a UN 'special rapporteur' means anyway,
there's a wp article:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United...ial_rapporteur have a
specific country or thematic mandate from the United Nations Human
Rights Council.

Human rights? Bezos' phone? Hmmmmmmmmmmmm.......

they went to all kind
of technical trouble to discover NO EVIDENCE, but accusing MBS anyway.

Kind of sums it up, albeit bluntly so.

Then, because suspicions still ran high, despite that lack of evidence,
apparently JB threw his weight around to get this UN HRC pair of
'rapporteurs' to make some noise about it.

Don't you wish _you_ had a rapporteur or two to track down your issues!

HRC = Human Rights Council of the UN - a place where everyone picks on
Israel instead of all of the other human rights problems of the world.

Everyone picks on Israel. It's been a fad since the forties.
o They used to pick on Turks; but that was before the world went to hell.

o Why do people hate Israel?
https://jewishjournal.com/opinion/131217/
"We live in a bad world."

--
Usenet is where purposefully helpful people publicly discuss things.