The W3C Referrer Policy document is a Candidate Recommendation dated 26 January 2017, not a new October announcement. This briefing pairs that background with current MDN documentation to explain a buying question: how much of a page address can a visitor’s browser send when following a link?

MDN describes strict-origin-when-cross-origin as the default policy. For same-origin requests it can send the origin, path and query string; for cross-origin HTTPS-to-HTTPS requests it sends only the origin. It sends no referrer on an HTTPS-to-HTTP downgrade. An origin includes the scheme, host and applicable port, not the full page path.

The no-referrer policy omits the Referer header. That limits this particular disclosure channel; it does not make a visit anonymous or remove information deliberately placed in the destination URL. Treat a referrer control as one privacy setting, not a promise that an analytics service cannot recognize a visitor.

Ask a hosting or website-builder provider which policy it delivers and whether page or link settings override it. Inspect representative same-origin and external requests in browser developer tools using non-sensitive sample URLs. Check the resulting behavior before changing analytics assumptions. This is a documentation briefing, not a browser audit or a new legal requirement.