Doesn't expose any "real" private info( eg: passwords ). If the intent of the piece was to get users to turn off Javascript and secure themselves, the possibilities laid out are not forceful enough to achieve that objective, imo.
Which sites you log into, is private information.
The Firefox addon "Request Policy" does protect from this attack, but it's not the most user friendly way to browse the web. I've been trying it out myself the past couple of days. Fine for geeks, but not fine for the average user.
The post you responded to is correct in that the title is somewhat incendiary compared to the reality, unless there is some possible hijacking or scraping vector from this, but that seems massively unrealistic.
That's what 'Noscript' is for.
That's what just using Lynx is for.
Yeah, lots of people go to this amount of trouble. Hell, why feel bad for people injured in car crashes? That's what five-point restraints and helmets are for.
Chill out, mon.