Affects of VPN and…

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  mercedesblak · Member · Sep 30, 2020 at 9:47 am

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  Hi,

  Can a moderator give me the run down on how VPNs and ‘ Do not track’ settings affect WordPress stats?

  Regards

  H

  The blog I need help with is: (visible only to logged in users)

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  supernovia · Staff · Sep 30, 2020 at 10:14 pm

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  Hi H, we can check in with our developers on that for you.

  Can you confirm you’re referring to the site linked, and also send a few more details about your question?

  Generally speaking, I’d say if someone’s not being tracked at all, we won’t be able to know they’re a repeat visitor, but I’m not sure whether anything else would be affected.

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  mercedesblak · Member · Oct 2, 2020 at 11:59 am

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  Hi,

  I’m referring to WordPress in general.

  Any information you can get will be useful.

  Thanks.

  H

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  staff-blorbo · Staff · Oct 2, 2020 at 6:05 pm

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  VPNs directly themselves won’t affect stats, but some VPNs do employ their own tracker blockers.

  When trackers blockers are employed, or folks do not want to be tracked, we do not track them, meaning their visits do not appear in your stats.

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  mercedesblak · Member · Oct 7, 2020 at 8:17 am

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  So, what does it say for those who might consider purchasing an upgrade to their wordpress if stats are deceptive?

  Is it not possible to identify a view without requiring intrusive data?
  I mean, my stats show search terms as undetected but it knows there was a view.
  What information does wordpress gather when a blog is visited?

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  staartmees · Member · Oct 7, 2020 at 8:40 am

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  Stats ain’t deceptive. When someone doesn’t want to be tracked, you must respect that choice.
  Info regarding tracking and gathered data, https://wordpress.com/support/tracking-opt-outs/

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  kokkieh · Staff · Oct 7, 2020 at 9:11 am

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  WordPress.com stats aren’t deceptive – we don’t withhold information or lie to you about the amount of visits to your site.

  WordPress.com stats are just limited, same as any other website analytics service out there – if someone is using a tracking blocker, either in their browser or on the network level, to prevent us from tracking them, there’s nothing we can do. We can’t log a visit we’re being prevented from detecting.

  Is it not possible to identify a view without requiring intrusive data?

  We don’t collect any sensitive data. We only record the fact that a page on your site has been viewed. But we can’t record a view/visit if we can’t detect it.

  I mean, my stats show search terms as undetected but it knows there was a view.

  Search term stats display information we receive from third parties. For example, if someone clicks on a link to your site that appears in a Google Search, Google tells us there was a clickthrough to your site from them. But that’s all they tell us – in most cases they don’t tell us the actual search term, which is why it shows as undetected.

  But for us to record a view, we need to detect that the person who clicked that link actually opened your site in their browser.

  What information does wordpress gather when a blog is visited?

  We record the location of the visitor based on their IP. We don’t log the IP address itself.

  And if they clicked through to your site from another website, we log the referrer header sent by the other website. Not all sites send referrer headers, and referrer headers can also be actively blocked by browser settings or add-ons, in which case they can’t be recorded at all.

  https://wordpress.com/support/stats/#frequently-asked-questions