The recent controversies around Facebook have brought about a lot of awareness with the general practices when it comes to data collection. Unfortunately, most people don’t realize the scale and volume of personal data collection going on. The good news is that with a few changes, you can restore your privacy online. Here are a few steps you can take:
Alternate accounts
One of the biggest problems is that due to convenience most users use the same email address and identify for all social networks online. If there are social networks, you want to use, establish individual accounts and identities for each. For example, if you want to use Twitter, use an identity and email address complete different from all your other accounts.
Block tracking
The other problem is that Facebook, Google, and other Ad companies track your movement across the web. The scary thought is that they know more about you than you know about yourself. Your likes, your dislikes, your relative preferences drive their ad machines. Use plugins like Ghostery and Ad blockers to prevent them tracking you across the web.
Sign-in credentials
Once again for convenience, users use their Facebook and Google accounts to sign-in to other sites. The problem is that you have given the tech giants a lot of personal information with that simple action. If you need to sign in to a service, create an account, ideally on a throwaway email address and don’t use a common password.
Obviously, the best way would be to stop using the social networks. However, if that is not an option, you can get the best of both worlds by isolating your presence on other sites from trackers.