
Stop donating your customers' data to Google Analytics - bakztfuture
https://dev.to/goatandsheep/stop-donating-your-customers-data-to-google-analytics-191
======
lbrito
So the solution is to use Amazon's tracker?

I appreciate the problem and I would like to stop using GA in my static pages
as well, but trading one privately-owned software from a tech giant for
another privately-owned software from a different tech giant seems a bit
ludicrous. I would readily swap GA for some decent open-source solution
though.

~~~
falcolas
I'd say the following to this (very reasonable) argument against using AWS:
AWS makes money by selling services, not collecting data. Should Amazon make
the leap and start harvesting data from AWS for marketing purposes, the data
from their analytics platform will be the least of our worries.

Thus far, AWS has proven to be safe for companies to host their data upon, and
there have been no leaks of data stored in AWS into Amazon's marketing
program. The HIPPA, PCI, and FedRamp certifications help back up their claims
that a company's AWS data stays in AWS.

~~~
Nullabillity
People said the same about Apple, and then it turned out to be bullshit.[0]
And, big surprise, their customers did not seem to hold them accountable.

So in the end, paying for stuff just shows that you're a more valuable product
to sell. And gives them a great primary key to track you by.

[0]:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22106536](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22106536)

~~~
falcolas
I've said this to most naysayers, but AWS aims itself at businesses, who are
much more forward with their pocketbook and lawyers in protecting their
privacy. AWS _can 't_ safely market data stored in their systems without
running the risk of being abandoned and sued into oblivion.

Even Google doesn't dare monetize data stored in their enterprise customer's
databases.

EDIT: Failing to offer a privacy-enhancing feature, and actively compromising
and mining your customers data are quite different scenarios.

~~~
alharith
Google doesn't dare _directly_ monetize data stored in their customer's
databases. There's zero doubt in my mind they are piping everything somewhere,
completely anonymized, and feeding their models.

------
pixelbath
I see a lot of suggestions for free or open-source analytics packages, but I
would refrain from recommending anything you haven't _personally_ used.

I've tried to separate myself from Google in various ways, and one of those
was to replace Google Analytics with open source software. I tried several;
they're all either non-functional out of the box, or require significant time
investment to even start approaching Google Analytics.

After losing about a month of stats (which matters when you're also running
AdSense), I ended up going back to Google. It took the same amount of time to
set up as when I initially set it up: around 2 minutes of adding the tracking
code and uploading it.

~~~
lern_too_spel
If you're using AdSense, you're already giving Google your visitor data, no
matter what visitor analytics package you use.

~~~
misterbwong
_If you 're using AdSense, you're already -selling- Google your visitor data,
no matter what visitor analytics package you use._

FTFY

------
AndrewStephens
The headline is wrong, it should be changed to "Stop donating your customers'
data to Google Analytics ... donate to another large corporation instead!"

There are much better options out there. Quite apart from the solutions listed
in these comments, a better option is to reconsider whether you really need
analytics at all. Maybe the answer is yes if you are a business trying to
understand your customers. But not every blog and project page needs
analytics.

~~~
runninganyways
Or you could write the 10 lines of JavaScript that'll do what 99% of people
use Google analytics for

~~~
mateus1
If you think you can replicate that with 10 lines you have no idea what Google
Analytics is used for.

~~~
anderspitman
I'm ashamed to admit that I use GA on my blog to essentially count page views.
The other information is interesting but mostly unused (by me). I would be far
better served by a tool or service handling server logs (any
recommendations?). But GA is 0 friction, so it's what I picked up back in the
day. I suspect there are a lot of people in this boat.

~~~
xorcist
Many of the common web log analyzers are a bit long in the tooth.

I've have used GoAccess for a while now and is mostly happy with it. It's fast
enough and can generate pretty good looking static html which is mostly what
you want for those simple use cases.

A side effect of processing log files is that you can freely try software on
historical data.

~~~
anderspitman
Do you have a recommendation on log format for GoAccess? I run a lot of custom
services with no nginx etc in front, so I'll have to figure out the logging
myself.

~~~
joshyi
You can always create an issue on their github page, lots of help in there:
[https://github.com/allinurl/goaccess/issues](https://github.com/allinurl/goaccess/issues)

------
ptasci67
A bit tangential but a quick click on the author's name in the article and
their bio reads:

> ex-Amazon contractor, front-end lover, accessibility nerd, down for building
> cool shit, especially Vue.js and Amplify.js consulting

My alarm bells ring when the answer to "stop using X" is to "start using Y"
where Y == company I worked for.

This isn't to say GA is or isn't problematic, but the article's bias is
problematic.

------
coldcode
It would be handy if people listed here all the alternatives that don't steal
your customer info.

~~~
rapnie
[https://usefathom.com/](https://usefathom.com/)

[https://goaccess.io/](https://goaccess.io/)

[https://github.com/NYPL/google-analytics-
proxy](https://github.com/NYPL/google-analytics-proxy)

[http://matomo.org/](http://matomo.org/)

[https://ackee.electerious.com/](https://ackee.electerious.com/)

[https://www.goatcounter.com/](https://www.goatcounter.com/)

[https://count.ly/](https://count.ly/)

~~~
gramakri
I gave many of these a visit.

fathom - Looks great. I am OK with closed source products (my motivation is
self-hosting/privacy) but the direction is not clear to me. Maybe they will
have a blog about it at some point -
[https://github.com/usefathom/fathom/issues/268](https://github.com/usefathom/fathom/issues/268).
Having multiple code bases is going to be super hard.

goaccess.io - this analyses web logs

google-analytics-proxy - project is dead

matomo - this is what i use now and it works great. has a lot of quirks but if
you spend some time, you can make it work.

ackee, goatcounter - simple but looks like this does not track users/sessions.
it's mostly for page hits.

countly - looks good if you are enterprise. there is no pricing :(

freshlytics (from another thread) - page says it's in beta and not production
ready

~~~
Carpetsmoker
GoatCounter author here: doing some form of session tracking is on the
roadmap; check back in a few months. The project is still quite new, with the
first "real" release only being last week :-)

As for Fathom, I find that last "since that people are confused"-comment
rather funny, since their messaging on this has been confused for almost a
year, haha

~~~
gramakri
Will do! I am already following your project :)

------
dempedempe
This seems like more of a promotion for AWS Pinpoint than a criticism of GA.

------
benbristow
Interesting that the page breaks if you're using Adblock because of Google
Analytics being in the URL.

Shows me a fun 'You are not connected to the internet' page that lets you
doodle on the page.

~~~
marcosdumay
Not on Firefox with uBlock Origin.

~~~
davidarkemp2
I'd check your filters - EasyPrivacy has -google-analytics- blocked in the URL

I got to it by adding the following filter

    
    
        @@||dev.to/goatandsheep/stop-donating-your-customers-data-to-google-analytics-191?i=i$xhr,1p

~~~
marcosdumay
EasyPrivacy was enabled.

My Firefox was a minor update earlier than the one on the sibling comment
(72.0.1). It has updated now, and the site claims that my connection is down
on my machine too.

Now that I have seen the message... It's a funny thing for a web page to
claim.

------
tmikaeld
The problem is usually competing with "free" and Google knows this, there are
privacy respecting alternatives like [https://www.visitor-
analytics.io](https://www.visitor-analytics.io) though.

------
II2II
> Tracker blockers are increasing in popularity so consumers can protect
> themselves against this tracking, reducing the effectiveness of your
> analytics.

More to the point: there is probably going to be a bias in the analytics.
Different people have different reasons for protecting themselves against
tracking, but it is highly unlikely that people who are unaware of or
disinterested in the issue will use a blocker.

------
unreal37
"My competitors tracking solution is ridiculous. You should get your head
examined if you use it. You should use mine instead."

Terrible argument.

~~~
modo_mario
You seems to have missed the arguments made tho. You get to avoid the cookies
and as someone else pointed out Amazon doesn't use the data. It's your data.

------
tzury
Did not read through, but from a quick look, I suspect anyone can grab the
code, and fill in your AWS with terabytes of garbage data which will end up in
an enromous amount of dollars in AWS billing.

Am I missing something?

~~~
choward
Machine learning. How can you say no to machine learning? Did I mention
machine learning?

------
JosIJntema
Interesting topic. This among others is one of the reasons we started building
Harvest. Just as with Google Analytics, you can start tracking data with just
a small snippet of Javascript.

We use Splunk as our data engine and you can install it on your own server.
This way you have full control, access and ownership of your data without
letting third parties get any data. In that sense Harvest is basically the
infrastructure that allows you to collect, store, use and visualize your data.

Besides that, we have been focusing on features that will help companies
comply with privacy regulations. It is proven that this is not always easy in
the complex world of online data.

For more information check
[https://harvest.graindata.com/en](https://harvest.graindata.com/en).

------
snowwrestler
The suggested Google Analytics implementation today is a collection of three
separate Google technologies: the original GA, Doubleclick cookies to track
demographics and interest, and Tag Manager to manage them.

The original GA does not give Google useful cross-site user data because it
uses only first-party cookies and anonymizes data as it collected it. To my
knowledge you can still implement GA this way If you want to. Such an
implementation would be GDPR compliant in not tracking any personal data,
although your counsel might still say you need to list them as “analytics”
cookies in a cookie banner (mine did).

~~~
nwellnhof
Yes, you can configure Google Analytics so that no data is shared with other
Google services, at least no data about single visitors. I also came to the
conclusion that using GA this way complies with the GDPR and I don't really
understand what all the fuzz is about.

~~~
allover
As someone going through this right now, the main difficulty in being GDPR
compliant with GA is the cookie problem.

You can either disable cookies to run GA in cookieless mode [1], which
presumably will affect how GA performs, since they can't determine repeat
visits (but this might be fine, depending on the type of site you have), or
you need to gain active consent to enable analytics cookies [2], which isn't
much good if you want metrics for all users, not just those that opt-ed in.

If someone has solved this reasonably, I'd love to hear how! For now it seems
like cookieless is my only option.

[1]
[https://developers.google.com/analytics/devguides/collection...](https://developers.google.com/analytics/devguides/collection/analyticsjs/cookies-
user-id#disabling_cookies) [2] [https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/guide-to-
pecr/cookies-a...](https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/guide-to-pecr/cookies-
and-similar-technologies/)

------
gpvos
I didn't know about AWS Pinpoint before, but from what I can see, it only
offers analytics for email and other messages, not for web pages, so
presenting it as a full alternative for Google Analytics is misleading.

~~~
rchaud
The article doesn't even seem to mention anything for which GA is nearly
indispensable. E-commerce analytics, conversion funnel visualization, customer
segmentation, etc.

------
projproj
I have fun looking at these stats (sites with Google tracking vs. sites
without) in a Firefox addon I made: [https://bitbucket.org/tayler/google-
spy/src/master/](https://bitbucket.org/tayler/google-spy/src/master/),
[https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/googley-
eyes/](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/googley-eyes/)

------
IdontRememberIt
While running my first business GA was not really usefull (We used internal
tools easier to integrate in the code and adapt to our needs).

However GA data showed its usefullness when selling the business. The data was
considered as a _trusted_ source of information for the buyer. And all the
definitions (unique user, etc) were aligned with the buyer's, so it was easier
for them to assess the metrics.

------
djsumdog
I tried Matomo (Piwik) recently, but I only do log analysis and it doesn't
really treat log access as a first class citizen. If you use Javascript
tracking, it's probably the right way to go.

I switched back to AWStats for my personal stuff. It's probably too basic for
business or company apps, but for your personal stuff without
javascript/cookies, it's still a great analytics tool.

------
StreamBright
I have created a simple workflow using AWS Lambda + Kinesis + S3 to track our
customers and not to have any 3rd party dependency. It took roughly 2 weeks
but it is worth it since do not leak customer data and we have much tighter
control over what we collect (no PII except the source ip that gets hashed in
the process).

~~~
macinjosh
> I have created a simple workflow using AWS Lambda + Kinesis + S3 to track
> our customers and not to have any 3rd party dependency.

Except for each of the 3 components you listed that make up your system. They
_are_ 3rd party dependencies,

~~~
whoisjuan
Everything is a 3rd party dependency then. The only way to not have a 3rd
party dependency is to build your own infrastructure and use open source
solutions (and even with OS you're still dependent).

I think OP was clearly referring to a self-managed solution as opposed to a
set of 3rd party services like GA, Segment, etc, where the flow of data is out
for your control.

------
gpvos
[http://archive.is/RAXU6](http://archive.is/RAXU6)

------
digitalengineer
Why not spin your own? This tool comes with a lot of tools out of the box and
can also run personalization techniques and more:
[https://harvest.graindata.com/en/store](https://harvest.graindata.com/en/store)

------
fretn
a few weeks ago my blood needed a checkup. They sent me the results by mail.
The results where on a non password protected but 'unguessable' url. And the
page ofcourse contained google analytics, I'm in the EU, I wonder if this is
legal

~~~
prox
If they haven’t notified you, and hence you can’t/didn’t comply, it probably
isn’t. Especially medical companies are scrutinized for following gdpr. You
could make a case here to either the companies privacy officer, or your
countries privacy watchdog.

[https://gdpr-info.eu/art-39-gdpr/](https://gdpr-info.eu/art-39-gdpr/)

------
pbalau
You really have 2 choices:

Are you relying _only_ on data you can get from your app? There is no reason
not to build your own solution.

Are you relying on data you can't get from your app/website? Then you can only
use GA, since FB does not have a service like this.

------
mariushn
The main issue is that competition is basically cut out due to the free
pricing of GA.

Very few businesses/people would choose to pay for something when GA is free.
Why do that? To tell your customers "we value your privacy"?

~~~
leokennis
Don’t you think that, in today’s climate, customer knowledge and involvement
about online tracking, fingerprinting, filter bubbles etc. is at an all time
high? And that makes this the best time ever to indeed be proud to tell your
customers that “we value your privacy”.

It’s one of Apple’s strongest marketing pillars.

------
brainlessdev
Related: the discussion about Goatcounter
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22044854](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22044854)

------
sdan
I'm currently building a _free_ analytics service that's the fastest. Ever.
Faster than Fathom, Simple Analaytics, pretty much everything except Google
Analytics you can think of.

[https://sdan.io/pingpong](https://sdan.io/pingpong)

Still building it, but you can sign up for when it launches here:
[https://forms.gle/MhojBWWfdiWjZatC7](https://forms.gle/MhojBWWfdiWjZatC7) (I
know it's ironically on google forms and I'll move away soon)

> [https://sdan.io/pingpong](https://sdan.io/pingpong)

~~~
october_sky
> I'm currently building a free analytics service that's the fastest. Ever.

How do you intend to make money from this free service?

~~~
sdan
If you're getting over a million hits I might add some incentive to donate,
but mainly I take this as my payback to the developer community. I'm launching
another product in a different domain at the moment and hoping that can
compensate.

At the end of the day, if anything goes wrong, I'll always be happy to open
source the whole thing.

------
jammygit
I have used simpleanalytics for a while. It offers a lot less granular
information because it deliberately collects less for privacy reasons

------
oarabbus_
The problem is GA is orders of magnitude better than the competition for price
to performance ratio.

------
drusepth
Is there a free alternative that has feature parity with GA and isn't very
difficult to set up?

------
snambi
Yeah right, stop using GA and start using Amazon analytics. Very good
suggestion.

------
aforty
And firebase analytics is much the same as GA right? In fact I think it’s even
viewed on the GA portal.

~~~
nrjames
Connecting Firebase to Google Analytics is optional, for now.

------
shadowgovt
> And if you think that's okay, you should take your head out of the sand
> because consumers are demanding it. Please tell me how many of your users
> like the large cookie agreement popups that they have to dismiss...I-I mean
> read and accept just to consume your content. Agreements that you're forced
> to have them agree to because you're using cookie-based trackers like GA.

I think that's the heart of why I so despise the GDPR. In an intent to change
site behavior, politicians passed a law putting a burden on sites that did an
undesirable thing (rather than, say, making the undesirable thing itself
illegal).

Perhaps they thought sites would avoid the burden.

Did they not anticipate full shifting of burden onto end-users? Because being
able to know how a site is used is _extremely_ valuable to the site's owners.

------
nicky0
Anybody ever heard of server logs?

