this post was submitted on 20 Oct 2025
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Privacy

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One thing I'm concerned about is recording equipment leaving identifiable information without us knowing about it.

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[–] Ohh@lemmy.ml 17 points 1 week ago (4 children)

No... But i've thought about how easy it would be to implement in ebooks and pdfs (e.g. my daily newspaper i can download as pdf). I've thought about this when sailing the high seas.

Is it a thing?

[–] Akrenion@slrpnk.net 10 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Watermarking is definitely a thing. Whistle-blower have to think about that as well.

[–] Ohh@lemmy.ml 9 points 1 week ago
[–] monovergent@lemmy.ml 7 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

It's prevalent among pdfs downloaded from academic publishers (text listing the receiving IP address and/or institution running down the margins). I wouldn't be surprised if it's also done with hidden white text or in the metadata.

[–] boboblaw@hexbear.net 6 points 1 week ago

Yes, ebooks too. If you're going to share those, learn how remove any identifying metadata. There are plugins for Calibre for this purpose.

Most ebooks I bought recently come with a warning that the buyer's data is embedded in the file to deter from sharing it online. TBF it cannot be hard to remove it but I didn't bother to check how it's implemented.