Do you recognize this feeling? You’re sitting with friends, discussing something you’re confident you’ve never looked up online. Then later, you start seeing advertisements for things related to the topic all over the place.
It doesn’t necessarily indicate that companies are listening in on you just because the subject you were interested in was the same one for which you were advertised. Likely, you’ve already given it all the information it requires.
We frequently give various websites and apps our information while granting them specific permissions, or we permit “cookies” to monitor our online actions.
Websites might remember information thanks to “first-party cookies.” For instance, login cookies let you store your login data, so you don’t have to enter it each time.
On the other hand, third-party cookies are placed on websites other than the ones you browse. Frequently, the third party is a marketing company that collaborates with the first-party website or app. The latter will host the marketer’s advertisements and grant it access to the information it has collected about you.
The marketer can paint a picture of your life, including your needs and preferences. These businesses are constantly attempting to ascertain how well-liked their offerings are and how this varies according to client characteristics such as age, gender, height, weight, occupation, and interests.
By categorizing and aggregating this data, advertisers can use recommender systems to target the correct customers with the most effective advertisements.
Additionally, artificial intelligence employs numerous machine-learning methods, such as data clustering, classification, association, and reinforcement learning (RL), to assist computers in filtering and analyzing data.
By clicking “like” on a social media post, you can indicate to an RL agent that you find the post or its publisher appealing. This way, the RL agent receives information about your preferences.
In fact, by rating those in your close surroundings according to how often you connect with them, AI algorithms may help marketers build your whole social network. Consequently, businesses utilize information from both you and your friends and family, who also use the same platforms to target you with advertisements.
It is now up to consumers to be vigilant about which rights to provide to the sites they use, even while app providers are supposed to present users with explicit terms and conditions governing how they collect, store, and use data.
In case you cannot decide what should be shared, provide permissions only as needed. On the other side of the picture, some people do not mind seeing ads customized to their needs. People with a more “utilitarian” approach to life prefer AI advice over humans.
But if you care about what ads you see and data shared online, there are a few tips you can follow:
To begin, you should examine your phone’s app permissions regularly.
Second, think twice before enabling cookies or authorizing access to a website or app. Avoid utilizing your social network accounts to connect to or log into other sites and apps. Additionally, try using a burner email if you wish to provide your email address.
Furthermore, remember that you only need to provide the necessary information while signing in. Installing a virtual private network (VPN) on your device to mask your IP address and encrypt your online transactions is something you should consider if privacy is a matter of great concern for you.
And if you’re still not convinced that your phone is not eavesdropping on you, try this:
Disable microphone access for all applications in your phone’s settings. Instead, pick anything you know you haven’t searched for on your device and talk about it with someone.
Give this procedure a few rounds. Then, in the next several days, your phone may not be “listening” to you if you don’t see any personalized adverts.