Among the reasons for this: data privacy.
I dont have a TikTok account, you might think.
But the modern internet is more complicated than that.
Luckily, there are tools in place that can find out when youre being tracked and whos doing it.
How do companies track me?
Youve probably heard the term cookies before.
These are probably the most obvious way you might get tracked online.
Enter the tracking pixel.
These operate in a similar fashion to cookies, but use images rather than text.
How do I know when Im being tracked?
If you know what to look for, justright clickand selectInspectfrom the drop down menu to begin investigating.
This will work on Chrome, Firefox, and Microsoft Edge, although Safari takesa bit more work.
Generally, though, you dont want to do this manually.
There are tools that automate the process for you, plus give context for what you’re looking at.
Feroot PageScanner has perhaps the most immediate interface for informing you when your data is being tracked.
Its intended for enterprise clients running security analyses on their sites, especially those looking to meetPCI compliance.
The least intrusive of these are surfing app extensions.
Ghosteryworks like PageScanner, except it can go a step further and actually restrict trackers.
It is available as an extension onChromiumandFirefoxbrowsers.
Unfortunately, it does change your default search engine to DuckDuckGo while active.
It is available as an extension onChromium,Firefox, andSafaribrowsers.
Privacy Badgerhas a similar function and interface to uBlock Origin, but is focused more on trackers than ads.
What Privacy Badger does do is learn to block trackers over time.
You have two choices here.
Second, and disabled by default, is local learning.
Privacy Badger is available onChromiumandFirefoxbrowsers.
Local learning can be toggled on and off via theOptionspage.
Finally, outside of the realm of extensions and websites that block tracking, there are VPNs.
A VPN essentially hides your browsing data by filtering it through other sources, obscuring your IP.
Thebest VPNsare paid services, but a few will encrypt your data for free.
Note that tracking pixels can also show up in emails.
To protect yourself from these, follow our guide on how tostop email images from loading by default.
