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Privacy Audit: scan your browser fingerprint in seconds.

A free, instant privacy audit. We expose the same signals advertisers use to track you — IP, fingerprint, fonts, and battery — directly in your browser.

no data leaves your device · ~1.2s avg

/knowledge-hub

How the Privacy Audit tool works

Everything you need to know about scanning your browser fingerprint, IP address, and device signals — explained in depth.

A deep look under the hood

Our free online browser fingerprint checker performs a complete digital footprint analysis directly inside your browser — no servers, no cookies, no account required. The moment you press Scan My Footprint, a chain of lightweight detectors fires in parallel to measure exactly what trackers and ad networks can learn about you.

First, the tool fetches your public IP address from a privacy-respecting geolocation endpoint to estimate your city, country, and ISP. In parallel, a hidden HTML5 canvas paints a small string of text, and the resulting pixel data — shaped by your GPU driver, anti-aliasing settings, and operating system — is hashed into a stable canvas fingerprint. A WebGL probe then asks for the unmasked GPU vendor and renderer string, two of the most identifying values in modern fingerprinting.

Next comes font enumeration: dozens of typeface names are rendered off-screen and compared against fallback baselines. Any mismatch in width or height proves a font is installed, and the resulting list is often unique to a single machine. The tool also reads your screen resolution, device pixel ratio, hardware concurrency, time zone, language, and the experimental Battery Status API — a known re-identification vector flagged by Mozilla and removed in some browsers.

All of these signals are concatenated and run through SHA-256 to produce a single deterministic fingerprint hash. A weighted risk model then translates the findings into a privacy score from 0 to 100, so you can instantly see how exposed your browser really is — and start hardening it.

Use cases for the Privacy Audit tool

From everyday users curious about online tracking to security researchers building anti-fraud pipelines, this lightweight scanner fits a wide range of workflows.

  • ▌ Personal privacy audit

    Find out exactly what advertisers, analytics scripts, and data brokers can see about you when you visit a website — and learn how to harden your browser against passive tracking.

  • ▌ Pre-purchase browser comparison

    Compare browser fingerprint uniqueness between Chrome, Firefox, Brave, Safari, and the Tor Browser before deciding which daily driver protects you best.

  • ▌ VPN and proxy verification

    Quickly verify that your VPN, proxy, or Tor circuit is masking your real public IP address and that no DNS or WebRTC leak is exposing your home network.

  • ▌ Anti-fraud and bot research

    Security teams and fraud analysts can sample real-world device fingerprints to tune risk scoring models, detect headless browsers, and benchmark anti-bot defenses.

  • ▌ Privacy-focused journalism

    Reporters and whistleblowers handling sensitive sources can sanity-check the device they use for research before opening encrypted communications.

  • ▌ Web developer QA

    Front-end engineers can validate that their privacy-preserving features — Permissions-Policy headers, font subsetting, and canvas blocking — actually reduce browser fingerprint surface area.

Frequently asked questions

Is this browser fingerprint scanner really free and private?

Yes. The Privacy Audit tool is 100% free, requires no signup, and runs entirely in your browser. The only network call leaves your machine to look up your public IP for geolocation; no scan results are stored or shared.

How accurate is the privacy score?

The score is calculated from a weighted model of the most common identifying signals — IP exposure, canvas fingerprint, WebGL renderer, installed font count, Battery API availability, and tracking preferences. It is a strong relative indicator, not an absolute guarantee of anonymity.

Can browser fingerprinting really track me across websites?

Yes. Because the combination of GPU, fonts, screen size, and time zone is often unique, third-party scripts can re-identify the same device across unrelated sites without any cookies, even in private browsing mode.

Which browser gives me the best protection against fingerprinting?

The Tor Browser offers the strongest defense by design. For everyday use, Brave with Shields enabled and Firefox with resistFingerprinting both significantly reduce the uniqueness of your fingerprint compared to default Chrome or Edge.

Why is the Battery Status API considered a privacy risk?

The Battery API exposes precise charge level and discharge time, which can be used as a short-lived re-identifier across tabs and even after clearing cookies. Mozilla removed it from Firefox for this reason; Chromium-based browsers still expose it to web pages.

/knowledge-base

What is browser fingerprinting?

A plain-English guide to the tracking technique that follows you across the web — without cookies, without consent.

The basics

Browser fingerprinting is a tracking technique that builds a unique ID for your device by combining dozens of seemingly harmless signals — your screen size, GPU, installed fonts, time zone, and more. Unlike cookies, you can't simply delete a fingerprint. Studies by the Electronic Frontier Foundation found that over 80% of browsers can be uniquely identified from these signals alone.

How fingerprinting works

When you load any modern website, JavaScript can interrogate your browser for hundreds of properties. None of these are personally identifying on their own — millions of people use Chrome on Windows. But the combination of attributes is rare enough to single you out.

Common signals scanned by trackers

  • IP addressReveals your approximate location and ISP.
  • User agentBrowser, version, OS, and device type.
  • Canvas & WebGLRenders an invisible image; tiny GPU differences create a unique hash.
  • Installed fontsThe exact list of fonts on your system is highly unique.
  • Screen & devicePixelRatioResolution and zoom level.
  • Battery APICharge level and rate — once used to re-identify users across sessions.
  • AudioContextSubtle differences in audio stack output produce a stable hash.

How to defend yourself

Perfect privacy on the open web is hard, but you can dramatically reduce your fingerprint uniqueness with a few practical steps:

  1. Use a privacy-respecting browser like Firefox or Brave with fingerprinting protection enabled.
  2. Install uBlock Origin to block known trackers and fingerprinting scripts.
  3. Avoid browser extensions that aren't strictly necessary — each one widens your fingerprint.
  4. Consider the Tor Browser when you need true anonymity.
  5. Use a reputable VPN to mask your IP address from third parties.

Frequently asked questions

Does this tool send my data to a server?

No. The entire scan runs in your browser. Only your public IP is fetched from a public geolocation endpoint to display your approximate location — no scan results are stored or transmitted anywhere by us.

Is browser fingerprinting legal?

In most jurisdictions, yes — though the GDPR (EU) and CCPA (California) require disclosure and, in some cases, consent. Enforcement varies and many trackers operate in grey areas.

Why does my fingerprint score change between visits?

Some signals are stable (GPU, screen) while others drift (battery, time zone in travel). The hash is deterministic for the same inputs, so refreshing without changing anything will produce the same fingerprint.