Random changing of "stuff" inside a Windows directory

[mike]

What is a working method on Windows to easily randomize a set of stuff?
(which happen to be fonts but which could be any collection of stuff)

This is a technical question (not a philosophical question on privacy).

When I ran a search, I found this visual basic method which I will try.
https://www.iptest.club/blog/fingerprinting/font-fingerprinting-protect/

But I came here because I found a "similar" solution for randomizing
the time zones when I ran a search of these archives in duckduckgo.

@echo off
setlocal EnableDelayedExpansion
:loop
set /a n=137*%random%/32768*3+1
for /f "tokens=*" %%i in ('tzutil /l^|more +%n%') do set a=%%i& goto :l1
:l1
echo.
echo.
echo setting time zone to: %a%
tzutil.exe /s "%a%"
:: wait 6-24h
set /a n=20864+(%random%*2)
set /a h=%n%/3600
set /a m=(n-(%h%*3600))/60
echo waiting %h% hours, %m% minutes
timeout %n%
goto :loop
exit 0

Does anyone on this newsgroup already have a similar randomization
working batch script that randomizes "stuff" in a directory?

[Andy Burns]

Post by mike
Does anyone on this newsgroup already have a similar randomization
working batch script that randomizes "stuff" in a directory?

rather than mess with the fonts themselves, can you hide most of them
from websites using browser settings, e,g for firefox

font.system.whitelist

Are you even sure that it's fonts which making you appear unique?

[mike]

Post by Andy Burns

Post by mike
Does anyone on this newsgroup already have a similar randomization
working batch script that randomizes "stuff" in a directory?

rather than mess with the fonts themselves, can you hide most of them
from websites using browser settings, e,g for firefox
font.system.whitelist
Are you even sure that it's fonts which making you appear unique?

There is nothing wrong with approaching the problem browser by browser by
browser by browser by browser, but the maintenance of that is an issue.

Better to approach the problem outside the browser itself, such that it
works with all browsers and the maintenance, once running, should be none.

As for being unique, I think you misunderstood so allow me to explain that
it's the sum total of your "entropy" which makes you unique.

However, the browser fonts are a major contributor to that entropy.

The proposed solution will work to lower that entropy, however you may
still have a unique set of characteristics - but - an important variant to
be aware of is that you will be unique each time (which makes it harder for
them to correlate that it's you).

If you need me to explain that point further, just ask as it's not
understood byo 99 out of 100 people what I just said so it's OK if you wish
me to clarify.

[Andy Burns]

Post by mike
As for being unique, I think you misunderstood so allow me to explain that
it's the sum total of your "entropy" which makes you unique.

No, I understand that it's the pieces they put together that make you
uniquely identifiable, but some factors contribute a little, others a
lot, e.g. here they're coded red/amber/green ...

<https://amiunique.org/fp>

On this machine there are two factors which are unique individually, and
several others which each pin me within less that 1/100th of a percent
of all users, so fiddling about with fonts would be kind of pointless.

I just wondered if you knew that fonts were your worst "giveaway", or
there might be something else you could focus on?

[mike]

Post by Andy Burns

Post by mike
As for being unique, I think you misunderstood so allow me to explain that
it's the sum total of your "entropy" which makes you unique.

No, I understand that it's the pieces they put together that make you
uniquely identifiable, but some factors contribute a little, others a
lot, e.g. here they're coded red/amber/green ...

OK. Good.
You understand that some things give you more/less entropy than others.
You understood the fonts are just one of those many things.

Post by Andy Burns
<https://amiunique.org/fp>

I was unique (which I had expected) using a default Firefox browser.
I saved the results as text from Firefox.
Please see my AmIUnique.txt values at the end of this discussion.

Post by Andy Burns
On this machine there are two factors which are unique individually, and
several others which each pin me within less that 1/100th of a percent
of all users, so fiddling about with fonts would be kind of pointless.

OK. Good.
You understand that you take anti fingerprinting issues one by one.

You start with the worst situation and when you fix that, you move down to
the next worst situation, and so on, until you're no longer unique.

To that end, I never said the only thing you "fiddle around with" are the
fonts. Fonts are just one of the things you "fiddle around with" in fact.

Generally the approach is to take the worst entropy situations in order.
That's why they give you the entropy in the first place.

One by one you whittle them down until you get to the fonts.
Then what do you do?

Post by Andy Burns
I just wondered if you knew that fonts were your worst "giveaway", or
there might be something else you could focus on?

I've run those EFF panopticlick style tests for so many years I can't count
how many. Let's say for at least five or ten years (I don't remember).

Often it's my fonts, but I have special fonts that I use for editing
documents that have to be printed to exacting trademark standards.

However, I could temporarily delete those fonts so I didn't bring up that
point because I think MANY PEOPLE have the problem that fonts have an
entropy which puts them higher on the list than if they didn't have fonts.

Looking at my numbers for entropy at that site you suggested, here
are my current AmIUnique.txt values using that one Firefox browser.

As expected, many things are worse than fonts in terms of entropy.
But fonts aren't good either.

All I want is an easy way to randomize the contents of a Windows folder
using the native tools that come with every Windows 10/11 installation.

AmIUnique <https://amiunique.org/>

* //My fingerprint <https://amiunique.org/fp>
* //My history <https://amiunique.org/history>
* //My extension <#>//My timeline <https://amiunique.org/timeline>//My
fingerprint stability <https://amiunique.org/stability>
* //Global statistics <https://amiunique.org/stats>
* //FAQ <https://amiunique.org/faq>
* //Privacy policy <https://amiunique.org/privacy>
* //Privacy tools <https://amiunique.org/tools>
* //Links <https://amiunique.org/links>
* //Survey <https://amiunique.org/survey>
* //Jobs <https://amiunique.org/jobs>
* //About <https://amiunique.org/about>
//My fingerprint <https://amiunique.org/fp>
//My history <https://amiunique.org/history>
//My extension <#>//My timeline
<https://amiunique.org/timeline>//My fingerprint stability
<https://amiunique.org/stability>
//Global statistics <https://amiunique.org/stats>
//FAQ <https://amiunique.org/faq>
//Privacy policy <https://amiunique.org/privacy>
//Privacy tools <https://amiunique.org/tools>
//Links <https://amiunique.org/links>
//Survey <https://amiunique.org/survey>
//Jobs <https://amiunique.org/jobs>
//About <https://amiunique.org/about>

My browser fingerprint
Are you unique ?
Yes!
You are unique among the 1529201 fingerprints in our entire dataset.

The following informations reveal your OS, browser, browser version as
well as your timezone and preferred language.

Moreover, we show the proportion of users sharing the same elements.
Windows 47.49%
Firefox 38.17%
Firefox v109 1.11%
Timezone UTC+5.5 1.57%
Language en 77.89%

Similarity ratio duration :
7 days = no
15 days = no
30 days = no
90 days = no
All time = yes

//Download your fingerprint
<xxx>// Download our browser extension
<https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/addon/amiunique/>

Search:
/HTTP headers attributes/
Attribute Similarity ratio //All time Value
User agent // 0.42% Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64; rv:109.0)
Gecko/20100101 Firefox/109.0
Accept // 27.86%
text/html,application/xhtml+xml,application/xml;q=0.9,image/avif,image/webp,*/*;q=0.8
Content encoding // 95.73% gzip, deflate, br
Content language // 31.76% en-US,en;q=0.5
Upgrade Insecure Requests // 90.76% 1
Do Not Track // 28.50% 1
Referer // 0.71% https://amiunique.org/fp
If none match // Unique

Showing 1 to 8 of 8 entries
Search:
/Javascript attributes/
Attribute Similarity ratio //All time Value
User agent // 0.46% Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64; rv:109.0)
Gecko/20100101 Firefox/109.0
Platform // 34.68% Win32
Cookies enabled // 86.73% yes
Timezone // 1.57% -330
Content language // 40.66% en-US,en
Canvas // 0.23%
List of fonts (JS) // <0.01% Arabic Transparent, Arial, Arial Baltic, Arial
Black, Arial CE and 129 others
Use of Adblock // 65.67% no
Do Not Track // 23.83% yes
Navigator properties // 0.22% 43 properties in navigator object
BuildID // 31.96% 20181001000000
Product // 87.55% Gecko
Product sub // 32.37% 20100101
Vendor // 32.75% No value
Vendor sub // 87.77% No value
Hardware concurrency // 23.88% 4
Java enabled // 87.43% false
Device memory // 39.67% No value
List of plugins // 34.62% Plugin 0: PDF Viewer; Portable Document Format;
internal-pdf-viewer. Plugin 1: Chrome PDF Viewer; Portable Document Format;
internal-pdf-viewer. Plugin 2: Chromium PDF Viewer; Portable Document
Format; internal-pdf-viewer. Plugin 3: Microsoft Edge PDF Viewer; Portable
Document Format; internal-pdf-viewer. Plugin 4: WebKit built-in PDF;
Portable Document Format; internal-pdf-viewer.
Screen width // 22.33% 1920
Screen height // 21.04% 1080
Screen depth // 79.05% 24
Screen available top // 78.37% 0
Screen available Left // <0.01% 1982
Screen available Height // 7.81% 1080
Screen available width // 0.11% 1858
Screen left // 0.49% 1920
Screen top // 32.16% 0
Permissions // 2.27% geolocation : denied
notifications : denied
persistent-storage : prompt
push : denied
WebGL Vendor // 8.30% Google Inc. (NVIDIA)
WebGL Renderer // 0.19% ANGLE (NVIDIA, NVIDIA GeForce GTX 480 Direct3D11
vs_5_0 ps_5_0)
WebGL Data // 2.31%
WebGL Parameters // 0.18% 26 different extensions
25 different general parameters analyzed
36 different shaders precisions analyzed
Use of local storage // 86.38% yes
Use of session storage // 86.46% yes
Use of IndexedDB // 87.20% yes
Audio formats // 16.36% No value
Audio context // 16.36% No value
Frequency analyser // 16.36% No value
Audio data // 16.36% No value
Video formats // 87.78% video/mp4; codecs="flac" : probably
video/ogg; codecs="theora" : probably
video/ogg; codecs="opus" : probably
video/webm; codecs="vp9, opus" : probably
video/webm; codecs="vp8, vorbis" : probably
Media devices // 5.29% Timeout
Accelerometer // 78.59% false
Gyroscope // 79.05% false
Proximity sensor // 79.05% false
Keyboard layout // 46.27% Not supported
Battery // 40.62% Not supported
Connection // 44.35% Not supported
key // 87.56% cookie
Location bar // 87.19% Visible
Menu bar // 87.22% Visible
Personal bar // 87.20% Visible
Status bar // 87.20% Visible
Tool bar // 87.20% Visible
Result state // 87.56% No value
List of fonts (Flash) // 87.45% Flash not detected
Screen resolution (Flash) // 87.45% Flash not detected
Language (Flash) // 87.45% Flash not detected
Platform (Flash) // 87.45% Flash not detected

Showing 1 to 59 of 59 entries
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Plugins detail
Number of plugin Similarity ratio All time Name of plugin
Plugin 0 35.34% PDF Viewer
Plugin 1 37.12% Chrome PDF Viewer
Plugin 2 36.01% Chromium PDF Viewer
Plugin 3 35.42% Microsoft Edge PDF Viewer
Plugin 4 36.15% WebKit built-in PDF

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the best experience on our website. If you continue to use this site, we
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[mechanic]

Post by mike

Post by Andy Burns

Post by mike
Does anyone on this newsgroup already have a similar randomization
working batch script that randomizes "stuff" in a directory?

rather than mess with the fonts themselves, can you hide most of them
from websites using browser settings, e,g for firefox
font.system.whitelist
Are you even sure that it's fonts which making you appear unique?

There is nothing wrong with approaching the problem browser by browser by
browser by browser by browser, but the maintenance of that is an issue.
Better to approach the problem outside the browser itself, such that it
works with all browsers and the maintenance, once running, should be none.
As for being unique, I think you misunderstood so allow me to explain that
it's the sum total of your "entropy" which makes you unique.
However, the browser fonts are a major contributor to that entropy.
The proposed solution will work to lower that entropy, however you may
still have a unique set of characteristics - but - an important variant to
be aware of is that you will be unique each time (which makes it harder for
them to correlate that it's you).
If you need me to explain that point further, just ask as it's not
understood byo 99 out of 100 people what I just said so it's OK if you wish
me to clarify.

I notice that 'Brave' browser claims some sort of
randomization,maybe that helps.

[mike]

Post by mechanic
I notice that 'Brave' browser claims some sort of
randomization,maybe that helps.

There is nothing wrong with approaching the problem browser by browser by
browser by browser by browser, which is what most people do I'm sure.

I want to approach it without caring what the browser is.

There are many advantages, one of which is works on all computers, for
example. Instantly, it works on every Windows PC in the world.

The browser by browser by browser by browser method can't do that.

All I need is a good way to randomize the contents of a Windows folder.
Using the native tools that come with every Windows 10/11 installation.