Have you ever chatted with a friend and received targeted ads that seem like a lot of money?
But rest assured, it’s not because your phone is listening to you – it doesn’t need to, it’s already getting too much information from you.
The same thing happened to Robert J. Reeve, who shared on Twitter why he was getting toothpaste ads on Instagram.
The privacy technologist described how, after staying at her mother’s house for a week, she started getting custom ads for a brand of toothpaste she used, even though she hadn’t spoken or searched for the brand. that’s on Google.
It says that all our smartphone apps collect massive amounts of data from our phones that data collectors pay to get from everywhere.
This means that things like our location, demographics, unique device identifiers and discount codes we use in a store, for example, are a set of data for sales.
Everything we buy or subscribe to is subject to your agreement to account for all data sharing in our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy.
However, data collectors take this into account if your phone is regularly in the same GPS location as another phone.
Then they begin to rebuild your network of people you regularly communicate with, and advertisers can view your environment, your interests, and your purchase and browsing history.
Basically – it starts showing you different ads based on the people around you like your family, friends or even co-workers. The rationale behind this is that it will serve you ads for things that you don’t really want, but only because it knows that someone you talk to regularly might like it.
This can start a conversation about the product in question – in the case of Robert’s toothpaste, for example.
So it’s actually cheaper and more powerful that we unknowingly give our phones.
Instead of “listening” to us on social media apps – which Robert says is a “conspiracy theory” that has been “debunked many times” – he simply compares aggregated metadata.
Apple’s iOS 14 feature notifies you whenever the microphone or camera is turned on.
When your phone’s microphone has recently been accessed, a small orange dot will appear in the upper right corner of the screen. And if your camera is recording, it will turn green instead.
If you want to make sure your apps can’t eavesdrop on you, open the Settings app and tap Privacy.
Once there, tap Microphone or Camera and turn off the switch for any app where you’re not using your camera or microphone.
If you change your mind and want to reauthorize, just follow the same steps by changing the keys.
For Android users, you can follow the same steps in your Settings by tapping Personal, Privacy & Security and then App Permissions.
Source: Daily Mail
Source: Arabic RT
