How To Protect Your Privacy Online

Your favorite smartphone apps, your preferred weather forecaster, your go-to photo sharing app, and other seemingly benign technologies likely reveal details about your life to companies looking to collect consumer data. While you want to protect your privacy online, they’re eager to gather thousands of data points on you every single day because more data means better accuracy for algorithms seeking to predict human behavior.

Data gathering can affect our lives in ways we can’t currently anticipate. If companies can accurately predict our purchasing behavior – and if they’re putting *perfectly* curated advertisements in front of us over and over again – do we minimalists stand a fighting chance?

October is Cybersecurity Awareness Month (who knew?!). While keeping your personal information safe online can seem overwhelming there are simple ways to both protect your data and trick the algorithms. Amira Dhalla is on the show today to offer a blueprint about how you can be cyber smart-er.

Here’s a preview:

[2:00] Beware of these  ‘deceptive patterns’ that trick us into giving away extra personal information

[10:00] The principles of threat monitoring applied to online privacy: Are quick-win benefits worth potential long-term risks?

[12:30] Why you shouldn’t automatically “Accept All Cookies” (online cookies aren’t all that tasty!)

[17:00] 5 privacy quick fixes you can enact in 5 minutes or less

[28:00] Thoughts on practicing an ounce of prevention

Resources mentioned:

• Firefox browser
• DuckDuck Go search engine
• securityplanner.org
• 30-Second Privacy Fixes: Simple Ways to Protect Your Data (via Consumer Reports)
• Want more episodes like this one? Check out #235: How To Clean Up Your Digital Carbon Footprint.

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