Your Web browsing history is totally unique

           Your Web browsing history is totally unique

French researchers who did some sanctioned browser sniffing find the majority of Internet users have unique browsing histories that make them identifiable.

 In a new study from the French public research institute Inria, (PDF) researchers themselves did the browser sniffing and discovered that most users have a completely distinctive history when it comes to Web sites they regularly visit. Their results show that users' browser history is akin to their fingerprints (totally unique)

Here`s what the study says:

 Our results show that for a majority of users (69 percent), the browsing history is unique and that users for whom we could detect at least 4 visited Web sites were uniquely identified by their histories in 97 percent of cases. We observe a significant rate of stability in browser history fingerprints: for repeat visitors, 38 percent of fingerprints are identical over time...The results indicate that Web browsing histories, which can be obtained by a variety of known techniques, may be used to divulge personal preferences and interests to Web authors; as such, browsing history data can be considered similar to a biometric fingerprint.