A private window resets cookies, not the device. Fingerly reports when a session runs in a private window, keeps recognising the device behind it, and weights the finding as context rather than as a verdict.
Know when storage keeps resetting. Metered paywalls, trial limits and one-per-customer offers all break in a private window. Knowing that a session is private explains why a visitor looks new to your cookies, while the visitor ID still recognises the device.
Native apps have no private window, so these signals exist only for browsers. Both ship with modest weights.
| Signal | Web | Android | iOS | What it means |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Incognito mode | 4 | n/a | n/a | The session runs in a private browsing window. |
| Privacy settings | 6 | n/a | n/a | The browser is configured for privacy, such as blocked trackers or refused cookies. |
Privacy settings needs several clues together before it fires, because most people who set them up are simply privacy-conscious.
Plenty of people browse privately for ordinary reasons: a shared computer, a gift, a medical question. That is why incognito ships with a default weight of 4, well short of the threshold of 30, and why privacy settings sits at 6.
Browsers change how private windows behave. When a browser change makes a private-window clue unreliable, the rule is to stop reporting it rather than to report ordinary windows as private. A missed private window costs one detection; a wrong one costs trust in the whole score.
Privacy mode alone is never a fraud verdict. Read it alongside the device, the network and what the account is trying to do.
Most of the value is explaining behaviour your cookies cannot, at the moments limits are enforced.
The meter follows the reader.
Count free articles against the visitor ID instead of a cookie, and use incognito as the reason a reader looks new.
A fresh window is not a fresh customer.
A returning device in a private window starting another trial is worth a look before the trial is granted.
Identity does not depend on cookies or browser storage, so a private window is recognised as the same device in the ordinary case. Browsers that randomise what they report are recognised less often, and the response says when it could not identify anyone.
Private windows in Chromium browsers such as Chrome, Edge and Brave, in Firefox, and in Safari on macOS and iOS. Coverage follows how each browser behaves, and a clue that stops being reliable after a browser update is withdrawn rather than guessed.
Rarely. Private browsing has many innocent uses. Use it to explain why a returning visitor looks new, and to add context at trial starts and metered limits.
Start with the signals, keep your own decisions, and pay only for what you identify. No credit card needed.