Kurt Shintaku's Blog

[Posted to the IEBlog at http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ie/archive/2010/08/16/add-ons-and-opting-out-of-google-analytics-without-them.aspx]

Add-ons, and Opting out of Google Analytics Without Them

Recently, Google made available the “Google Analytics Opt-out Browser Add-on.” This add-on enables consumers to “indicate that information about the website visit should not be sent to Google Analytics.” We agree that making it easy for consumers to protect their privacy is good, and Internet Explorer offers a variety of features to help keep you in control of your information when visiting websites. In this post, we describe how to use some of these built in features to accomplish the same outcome without installing a Browser Helper Object and the Google Update Service.

Users of Internet Explorer 7 and 8 (and soon 9) who wish to prevent Google Analytics’ script from running can follow these steps:

1. In Internet Explorer, open the Tools menu and click Internet Options.
2. Click the Security tab and then click the Restricted Sites icon.
3. Click the Sites button.
4. In the box at the top, add *.google-analytics.com and push the Add button.
5. Click the Close button, and then the OK button to dismiss Internet Options.

After this configuration change, script from the Google Analytics website will not run on any webpage, and cookies will never be sent to the Google Analytics server.

NOTE:  THIS HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH PREVENTING ADVERTISEMENTS
I’m going to reiterate something written in the comments:  This article has nothing to do with blocking advertisements:  Google Analytics is about tracking/tracing where you surf on the web and getting statistics about what sites you use, such as how long you stayed on a page, what information you entered into the site, etc.. 

There has been some confusion about what this post is about:  It’s specifically there to ensure that Google doesn’t keep a record about your surfing habits, tendencies, and behaviors across Google Analytics enabled web sites – which is a good chunk of the Internet.

i.e. It’s about privacy.  This is a simple method by which you can protect yourself in Internet Explorer without installing any “software” to do so.