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I need to collect information about a user's computing device when they sign up for a networking site. I have coded a sign-up form to register utilizing Ruby on Rails 2.0. Could this be a plugin utilizing Jquery? Or, some type of background script that executes and collects that information in a temp hash file that is held in memory until the Registration completes.

Any ideas about the most efficient way to accomplish this feat is greatly appreciated.

SVincent
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You can't get that information with JavaScript, and besides that, most computers have multiple MACs, plus these can be arbitrarily re-written at will.

If you want a unique identifier for your user you'll have to create it and supply it in a persistent cookie. The only information you can get about the user through JavaScript other than that pertains to what browser they're running and their external IP address or the one of the proxy or VPN they're using.

Technically you can get a little more information than that, like evaluate which plugins they have installed, but probing that deeply does come off as highly invasive and isn't recommended.

tadman
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  • Thank you for your response. Just so you know, the user is given a disclaimer form informing them of what is being collected, including their Mac Address. With that said, I guess I could have the user give that info to us in the form. However, that could present a security risk to the user. Any other idea's will be greatly appreciated. – SVincent Oct 08 '15 at 21:05
  • Just out of curosity, isn't a persistent cookie also a security risk? – SVincent Oct 08 '15 at 21:07
  • @SVincent Users have the option of disabling or deleting cookies, so they can opt-out if they prefer. It's still the standard way of identifying a user or user's computer. The MAC address collection is still a super bad idea, and on some devices will return random data deliberately. See also [this answer](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3385/mac-addresses-in-javascript). – tadman Oct 11 '15 at 20:37