I know that everyone in the world today wants to know pretty much everything (possibly more than one's spouse) about everyone.

Does Stack Exchange have an official policy on honoring [Do Not Track](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Do_Not_Track) browser settings?

For what it's worth, my browser settings clearly say:

> Tell sites that I do not want to be tracked

![Firefox browser settings][1]

However, upon navigating to any of the SE sites, it's evident that [Do Not Track](http://donottrack.us/) setting isn't being honored.

[Privacy Badger](https://www.eff.org/privacybadger) browser extension from [EFF](https://www.eff.org/) tells me that I _am_ being tracked:

![privacy badger screenshot showing trackers][2]

Moreover, on https://stackoverflow.com I see another site doing the same:

    http://engine.adzerk.net

I understand that there is no legal requirement to honor the setting.  I just wanted to understand the public stand that Stack Exchange takes in this regard?

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The [Privacy Policy](http://stackexchange.com/legal/privacy-policy), as of now, doesn't answer this question.

It says:

> If anything in this policy seems unclear, please don’t hesitate to
> contact us at [email protected], so we can address your question
> and possibly clarify this document.

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**EDIT:** One of the comments claims that it's not Stack Exchange but the advertisers who are tracking.  While one of the SE sites <https://qa.sockets.stackexchange.com> happens to be on the list of those that are attempting to track the user, the others are advertisers.  Why can't Stack Exchange ensure that it's advertisers offer a mechanism of [tracking opt-out](http://donottrack.us/implementations)?

It's funny to see that those contributing under [cc-by-sa](http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/) are tracked by Stack Exchange and/or it's advertisers without [any clear word about the policy](https://stackexchange.com/legal/privacy-policy).

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**EDIT:** Another comment points out that https://meta.stackexchange.com/questions/210658/houston-we-are-web-bugged is _related_.  Please note that this post is about asking whether Stack Exchange and it's advertisers are committed to honoring "Do Not Track" settings.  Regardless of what the take is, the [Privacy Policy](http://stackexchange.com/legal/privacy-policy) probably needs to be clear about it.  If it's known that your advertisers would track the users against their wishes, then it's better to state it explicitly.

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**EDIT:** [This post](https://meta.stackexchange.com/questions/142068/stack-exchange-has-a-new-clearer-stricter-privacy-policy) claims that SE has a _new, clearer, stricter privacy policy_ that is:

  - Actually readable by human non-lawyers

Yet it fails to answer this basic question and it appears that there is little willingness to answer it.

Is there a reason for not saying that SE and/or it's advertisers would not honor [Do Not Track](http://donottrack.us/)?

  [1]: https://i.sstatic.net/d7ndf.png
  [2]: https://i.sstatic.net/VRa4i.png