SST-Guard: Detecting and Characterizing Server-Side Google Analytics in the Wild

Online tracking has shifted from client-side to server-side methods, where the browser sends tracking requests to an intermediate endpoint that forwards them to the tracker’s endpoint, making traditional blocking mechanisms ineffective. We introduce SST-Guard, a detection system that identifies server-side Google Analytics by recognizing consistent semantic information patterns across multiple channels—network requests, cookies, and browser objects—rather than relying on endpoint identification. Testing on the Tranco top-10k websites, SST-Guard detected server-side Google Analytics on approximately 4% of domains with over 93% accuracy. Broader deployment found this tracking method in about 4.21% of the top-150k websites studied.

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