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What is CDP detection?

The Chrome DevTools Protocol (CDP) is the channel Playwright and Puppeteer use to control Chromium. Using it isn't visible by itself, but several CDP operations have observable side-effects inside the page.

Common tells: enabling the runtime domain (Runtime.enable) changes console/error behavior in detectable ways; scripts injected to run “on new document” can be spotted; and evaluating in the page's main world instead of an isolated one leaves traces a detector can find.

Mitigation is about how the browser is driven, not just its fingerprint: run injected logic in isolated worlds, avoid the leaky domains, and don't add the automation flag. See the three layers detectors read.

Clearcote puts this into practice

An open-source Chromium with fingerprint control compiled into the engine. A drop-in for Playwright & Puppeteer.

Free for one browser with GitHub. No card.