30 Mar, 2009
Will Google Analytics work in a secured Intranet Environment?
Posted by: Mr Otter In: google
Recently, I was dumbfounded when during a presentation, an IT Consultant asked me if Google Analytics (GA) will actually work in their environment which is protected by a barrage of firewalls. Now wanting to give a wrong answer (even though I was pretty confident that it was yes…) I told her that I will check it out….
The answer is a resounding yes!
On second thought, it should be obvious. GA works on the http protocol and generally very, very few intranets block the http port. But even if the http port is blocked (for in-bound traffic such that the server cannot access the internet, but the internet can access the server…), it would not have mattered….
This is because the GA codes are executed by the clients and not the server.. and these clients must definitely have internet access to see a internet web page…. Just took a peek at the net traffic in Firebug and sure enough.. we see google sneakily simulate a blank image download to track the statistics…
Isn’t this exactly what we do tot track email open rates?
