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p/dontref-meSave yourself from being tracked by evil URL references
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Rushi

DontRef.Me - Save yourself from being tracked by evil URL references

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DontRef.Me helps you fight over the URL traces that follow you everywhere over the internet.
As an Open Source project, you're always welcome to review the code on GitHub.

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Joseph Djenandji
quite ironic that product hunt usually refs the links to the websites.
Shivani Patel
Maker
😅
Ryan Hoover
Haha, I know it's a hyperbole but not sure I'd call URL references evil.
Rushi
Maker
@rrhoover Haha.. we took How to post a product article way too seriously: "Tagline - Very short description of the product (make it catchy!)" 🙈
Daan Debie
@rrhoover That's what I would say too, when I run a website that uses and proliferates evil URL references all over the place ;)
Shubham Agrawal
Can you also give a way to convert short links like bit.ly to convert it to the actual URL? This way, you can improve privacy too.
Shivani Patel
Maker
@shubham_agrawal5 Thank you for your suggestion, we really value it!! This seems like a great idea and we would definitely consider it for further enhancements :)
Rushi
Maker
@shubham_agrawal5 Thank you for a great feedback. We are surely adding it to our enhancement list.
Mrigank Pawagi
Great idea! I had like to know how you Exactly Differentiate between a useful reference and an Unnecessary reference.
Rushi
Maker
@mrigankpawagi1 Thank you Mrigank for the feedback. We did go through some good amount of URLs to understand useful and tracking references and added support for some speacial cases. Did I mention that we are open source and you're always welcome to checkout the source code. :)
Mrigank Pawagi
@rishijash Sounds good.
Shivani Patel
Maker
Hi PH, Shivani from DontRef.Me team here, we are privacy enthusiasts who are making a small contribution by spreading awareness and improving privacy while browsing. DontRef.Me contributes towards privacy by removing the unnecessary references from the URLs and making people aware of the URL structure and the traces it leaves behind. We also support recursive reference URLs. So, feel safe by not leaving your traces behind while browsing or sharing URLs over the internet. We would love some feedback and happy to answer your questions. 🙏
Vishrut Shah
Works like a charm!
Nicholas Merten
awesome! great idea
Alexander Payne
Seems like a great tool!
Osman Erdi Balcıoğlu
How can we measure and provide better products for our clients without ref urls? Why and How it's bother you?
Rushi
Maker
@nicetr Thank you for reviewing the product and asking an amazing question. Our goal is to remove tracing references from url ie. clickId or queryId while making sure the basic reference to access the product stays in the url. As a user, it is always nice to have that option. Hope this helps but happy to answer more. :)
Serim
What is the difference between DontRef.Me and just simply erast the text after "/?" ? @shivani_23
Shivani Patel
Maker
Hi @mert_serim, thank you for taking a look at our product, this is a great question and I will be happy to answer that we have given two options for the users - So if you go to dontref.me (without /?) you ll be able to access our front end tool to convert your URLs whereas with /? followed by URL ll simply remove the references and redirect you to the webpage. Easy peasy I would say. 😁 I hope that answers your question :)
Anna Filou
@mert_serim @shivani_23 that wasn't his question. What he means is: how is typing "dontref.me/?" Bbefore the link we want to visit and then pasting the actual link any better/faster/easier than manually removing the ref part of the link?
Shivani Patel
Maker
Hi @anna_0x, thank you for clarifying, I would say that after studying a lot of URLs and it's references we encountered that URLs are tricky and can have references that are required or removing all of them won't lead you to the page you are expecting - you can check out the third picture in our post as an example (Facebook URL converted). We have tried our best to address these tricky URLs. I hope that helps and answers your question @mert_serim and if not we are happy to address any questions you have :)
Damjanski
<3
Anna Filou
This would be much more useful as a browser extension. AdGuard recently started doing just that
Krishna De
Nice idea - I do suggest that you get a security certificate for the website as it is currently showing as unsecure in browsers on mobile and desktop
Rushi
Maker
@krishnade Thank you.. We will try to fix it soon!!