SexyBookmarks by Shareaholic is a popular WordPress plugin that easily adds a social bookmarking menu to your posts, pages, and/or home page.
Warning: One of the default settings of the SexyBookmarks plugin is it tracks and displays your website analytics publicly in two places.
If you don't pay attention and set it up correctly, you will leak data that you should be keeping private.
For example: I just checked a blog's website profile and it displayed this:
http://DOMAINNAME/wp-login.php?loggedout=true – Page Views: 13
And the login link is clickable. Your login url should never been displayed publicly!
To check to see if your website profile is listed, head over and search for your domain name at http://www.shareaholic.com/publishers/analytics/ and http://www.shareaholic.com/siteinfo/.
How to Hide SexyBookmarks Site Analytics
My good friend and colleague, Christine Cobb has posted more details and how to disable your website statistics from showing up on shareaholic. Go to:
Sexy Bookmarks – An Update
http://mybonusblog.com/sexy-bookmarks-an-update/
By Christine Cobb
Whether your using the SexyBookmarks plugin now or you're thinking about installing it, be sure to click the link above so you set it up correctly.
Hey Regina,
Thanks for helping me dig into this new version and giving me the code to share with everyone to make our sites more secure.
You’re welcome Christine!
Thanks for your post on how to turn off the public analytics on shareaholic. I’ve seen several plugins that collect data and also slow down websites. Ethically, I think plugin developers need to make it more clear when they’re collecting data in the settings section of their plugins.
Hmmm, I was thinking of replacing sexy bookmarks with diggdigg anyway cos I think it looks better. Definitely gonna do it now!
Hi Dave,
I haven’t tried the diggdigg plugin before. Please let me know how it goes and if it has a way to turn off third-party tracking.
Regina,
When I check these links–after I have made all the suggested changes, should I still be seeing my info? It appears that I am.
http://www.shareaholic.com/publishers/analytics/ and http://www.shareaholic.com/siteinfo/.
Hi Sheri,
Unfortunately, you cannot get rid of those. I have searched high and low on how to remove them and there is NO documentation for it. It’s there and there it will stay. Gets me all fired up!
Maybe try contacting them and see if you can “request’ to get your site removed. If you find anything else out please let me know.
The only thing I was able to make private was my user profile, which I had to create an account and go into http://www.shareaholic.com/account/profile at the bottom under Visibility and change to “hidden” and you HAVE to click on Public Search “edit settings” to disable.
Sheri – If you turn off third party sharing, you are still sharing with Shareaholic which owns Sexy Bookmarks. This is no different than having your site bookmarked at Digg, Technorati or Stumbleupon which is a good thing.