Profile merge issues since ECID is same when multiple users share the computer to access a site

[velventhan]

We have an issue where multiple users when accessing our site using a public/shared computer, all the users get merged into 1 profile since the ECID is the same for all. This has corrupted our user data in CDP as many profiles don't have reliable info and it belongs to someone else. I believe this is a very common issue that many might be facing, it would be great if anyone can let me know if there is a solution or workaround to this issue.

Thanks in advance.

[ranjithd]

Other identifiers, such as cookies, session IDs, or user login credentials, should be considered in addition to the ECID for identifying and tracking individual users. These IDs should be unique to each user and should remain consistent between sessions.
Set up user authentication: Implement a user authentication system that requires users to use their own credentials to log in. Each user will have their own account/profile, and their activity will be linked to their own accounts.
Make use of secure session management: Make sure your website uses secure session management strategies. At login, assign each user a unique session ID and correlate all subsequent user activity with that session ID. In this manner, even if numerous people share the same computer, their data remains secure and sessions remain separate.

[maggod · Accepted solution]

Hello, this has already been discussed here
I heard about (kind of) a workaround. Please reach out to your Adobe Customer Success Manager to get this information.

[Danto8]

Hi Maggod thanks for your help.

Could you explain a bit more about that "kind of a workaround" please? or is this solution customized for each client?

Best regards.

[maggod]

Please reach out to your Adobe Customer Success Manager. If the workaround is still offered only Adobe can help.

[costa_n11]

Hi @Danto8 

While waiting for the feature that will close the gap on shared device ID principle, you have 2 or 3 possibilities:

1. You can apply ECID strategy as mentioned by @ranjithd , 
2. ANother way, pretty similar is to remove the cookie holding the ECID during logout , this will force the ECID service to generate a new ECID. An person logs in and activities are associated to a ECID, when it logs out, a new ECID is generated and the events after the logs out become anonymous
3. Another way but it won't prevent the profiles to merge is to swap the primary identity in the identity map at login and subsequent events during the authenticated session, you would set the primary identity to your customer identifier, ECIDs becoming a secondary identity  
4. The workaround proposed by Adobe is to hide the profiles impacted by the Shared Device ID principle to any profile lookup, profile UI, audience activation, etc... These profiles are still present in the Unified Profile and can be accessible via a non stitching merge policy however these profiles won't be made available to audiences (depending of the stitching policy selected in the audience setting) and won't be made available on edge network (only 1 merge policy is available on edge network) the workaround is a "drastic" solution to avoid sending the wrong communication / personalisation to the wrong person / visitor

What we've observed is that the Shared Device ID principle affect less than 1% of the profiles, you can ask the state of your data by contacting Customer Support to request a Shard Device ID report, you would have to specify the namespace you want the data to be analysed. Adobe will provide you the overview and you can et some samples....

From what we've seen, the workaround / interim solution is the solution that is most acceptable under the circumstances and you need to get it implemented as mentioned by contacting Customer Support...

Any other solutions will require you to fine-tune the integration of web SDK / Mobile SDK to play with the ECID service, it has been done and can be bit convolutive and cumbersome...

Thanks

Denis