Re: [w3c/manifest] Privacy Review: handle start_url tracking (#399)

Thanks @npdoty for the clear breakdown of options.

I think 2 is reasonable, and something we've been thinking about in a wider context (e.g. on [Web Share Target](https://github.com/WICG/web-share-target/issues/84#issuecomment-532999136)) is that the "installedness" of a PWA should be tied to the local storage of the origin, just like service workers, indexed DB, cookies, etc. If you install an app, you should expect its data to remain persisted on the device. By corollary, if you clear the data associated with an app, you would expect the app to be uninstalled.

This should happen in both directions: if you uninstall an app, we should ask if you want to clear origin storage (I believe we're starting to do this in Chrome).

I am happy to add language to the manifest recommending that user agents tie installedness together with the app. This can't be a requirement, though, since clearing of user data is a UI feature of browsers, not something directly speccable. Also, it may not be possible to do so programmatically on some platforms (I think on Android, if you clear site data from inside the browser, we don't actually have the ability to delete home screen shortcuts).

Number 1 is not feasible. We can't say "should not be used for user-specific data storage" because the specification controls the behaviour of user agents, not sites. And as I said previously, interfering with the transmission of the manifest is a minefield.

-- 
You are receiving this because you are subscribed to this thread.
Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub:
https://github.com/w3c/manifest/issues/399#issuecomment-535295486