Incognito (Chrome) and Private Browsing (Firefox, Safari) are designed to leave no trace on the device you're using. They are not designed to make you anonymous on the internet. The browser doesn't save your history, cookies, or form data after you close the window, but every other party in the chain (your ISP, the sites you visit, ad networks, your school or workplace network) sees you exactly the same as in a normal window.
What incognito mode actually does
When you open an incognito or private window, the browser changes a few things about how the session is stored locally:
- Browsing history isn't added to your normal history
- Cookies and site data are isolated to the window and deleted when you close it
- Form data (autofill, passwords) isn't saved
- Cache (images, scripts) is wiped on close
- Permissions you grant (location, camera, mic) only last for that session
That's the entire feature. Everything else about your browsing, every network request, every IP packet, every fingerprint signal you send, works exactly the same as a non-incognito window.
What incognito does not hide
This is where most people are surprised:
- Your IP address is the same. Every site you visit sees the same IP as it would normally.
- Your internet provider sees every domain you connect to. Encrypted DNS helps with this; incognito mode does not.
- Your school, workplace, or coffee-shop Wi-Fi network can log every site you visit. Incognito doesn't change that.
- The websites you visit see you the same way they always do. They can identify you by login, by IP, or by browser fingerprint, none of which incognito affects.
- Browser fingerprinting works fine. Your screen size, fonts, audio hardware, and graphics card all still uniquely identify your device.
- Government surveillance isn't affected. Network-level monitoring still sees everything.
- Browser extensions in some browsers can still see your activity, and many remember it.
Where the misconception comes from
The naming is part of it. "Incognito", "private", "InPrivate", all of these words sound like they hide you from everyone. But the feature was originally built for a much smaller use case: shared computers. The classic example is using a friend's laptop to log into your email without their browser remembering your password, or shopping for a gift on a family computer without it showing up in the autofill of every search box.
Browsers also tightened the warnings over time. Chrome's incognito splash screen used to be vague; now it explicitly says "your activity might still be visible to: websites you visit, your employer or school, your internet service provider." The legalese is there because Google was sued for misrepresenting incognito mode and settled.
If you want actual privacy, here's what each layer needs
True privacy isn't a single switch, it's a stack of decisions:
- Hide from your ISP and Wi-Fi network: encrypted DNS or a VPN.
- Hide from advertisers across sites: tracker blocking, fingerprint defence, third-party cookie blocking.
- Hide from the websites themselves: don't log in, use a fresh browser profile, or use Tor.
- Hide from a state-level adversary: Tor Browser, Tails, plus operational security.
Incognito mode does none of these. A privacy browser like Dazr does most of them by default, anti-fingerprinting, tracker blocking, encrypted DNS, no telemetry, without you having to remember to open a special window. Open a Private Window in Dazr and you get the incognito features on top of the privacy defaults.