Blacklight

FlowingData published an article that needs broadcasting. They wrote that

Companies are tracking what you do online. You know this. But it can be a challenge to know the extent, because the methods are hidden on purpose. So The Markup built Blacklight

The Markup offer a wide range of articles you should probably read. They also “spent 18 months building a one-of-a-kind free public tool that can be used to inspect websites for potential privacy violations in real time. Blacklight reveals the trackers loading on any site—including methods created to thwart privacy-protection tools or watch your every scroll and click.”

Whether you read their articles or not you should definitely try Blacklight. When I did, I discovered that this website owenkelly.net, which I built from scratch, using a theme I designed myself from scratch, apparently hosts one tracker. According to the Blacklight report

Websites containing advertising tracking technology load Javascript code or small invisible images that are used to either build your advertising profile or to identify you for ad targeting on this site. These techniques are often used in addition to cookies to profile you.

Blacklight detected trackers on this page sending data to companies involved in online advertising. Blacklight detected a script belonging to the company Alphabet, Inc.

This raises a very interesting question. Since I definitely had no part in putting a tracker on this site (and the site uses no front-facing plugins), how did it get there and how can I find it?

I will start searching, and make a note of what, if anything, I discover.