{"id":189,"date":"2024-12-19T20:00:17","date_gmt":"2024-12-19T20:00:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploringstudent\/chapter\/protecting-your-privacy-on-apps-and-websites\/"},"modified":"2025-08-08T16:53:19","modified_gmt":"2025-08-08T16:53:19","slug":"protecting-your-privacy-on-apps-and-websites","status":"publish","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploringstudent\/chapter\/protecting-your-privacy-on-apps-and-websites\/","title":{"raw":"Protecting Your Privacy on Apps and Websites","rendered":"Protecting Your Privacy on Apps and Websites"},"content":{"raw":"Almost all of kids\u2019 favourite apps and websites make money from targeted advertising, which uses their personal information to choose which ads to show them. Many of them also sell the data they collect to data brokers, which use information from many sources to make detailed profiles of users. Some also share it with other apps that are owned by the same company, such as Google and YouTube or Instagram and Facebook. But as William Budington of the Electronic Frontier Foundation says, \u201cThere are things you can do to protect your privacy by 85, 90, 95 per cent that will not add much friction to your life.\u201d Here are a few key ones:\r\n<ul>\r\n \t<li>Install privacy-protecting plugins such as Privacy Badger on laptops and desktops and apps such as DuckDuckGo on mobile devices.<\/li>\r\n \t<li>Review what information different apps are collecting on mobile devices.<\/li>\r\n \t<li>Review and customize privacy settings. For example, here\u2019s how you can turn off tracking and targeted ads on:\r\n<ul>\r\n \t<li><a href=\"https:\/\/myaccount.google.com\/data-and-privacy\">Google and YouTube<\/a><\/li>\r\n \t<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/privacy\/checkup\/\">Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram<\/a><\/li>\r\n \t<li><a href=\"https:\/\/support.tiktok.com\/en\/account-and-privacy\/personalized-ads-and-data\">TikTok<\/a><\/li>\r\n<\/ul>\r\n<\/li>\r\n \t<li>Don\u2019t sign in to any apps or websites using your social network logins. You can also make secure and disposable email addresses using <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sharklasers.com\/\">SharkLasers<\/a> or <a href=\"https:\/\/proton.me\/mail\">ProtonMail<\/a> if you want to register for something without giving away your regular email address.<\/li>\r\n \t<li>Go into your devices\u2019 Settings and turn off apps\u2019 permission to access the camera, microphone and location.<\/li>\r\n \t<li>If you use iOS devices like iPhones or iPads, make sure to refuse data collection when installing new apps. If you use Android devices, install the DuckDuckGo app and turn on App Tracking Protection.<\/li>\r\n \t<li>Accept only the minimum required level of data collection on websites \u2013 first, by never clicking \u201cAccept All,\u201d and then by looking for phrases like \u201cReject All\u201d or \u201cOnly Necessary.\u201d<\/li>\r\n<\/ul>\r\n<img class=\"aligncenter wp-image-188\" src=\"https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploringstudent\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/13\/2024\/12\/Cookies-300x85.png\" alt=\"Five options for a website to collect cookies. They say: View Cookie Settings, Accept All Cookies, Allow All, Reject All, and Confirm My Choices.\" width=\"642\" height=\"182\" \/>","rendered":"<p>Almost all of kids\u2019 favourite apps and websites make money from targeted advertising, which uses their personal information to choose which ads to show them. Many of them also sell the data they collect to data brokers, which use information from many sources to make detailed profiles of users. Some also share it with other apps that are owned by the same company, such as Google and YouTube or Instagram and Facebook. But as William Budington of the Electronic Frontier Foundation says, \u201cThere are things you can do to protect your privacy by 85, 90, 95 per cent that will not add much friction to your life.\u201d Here are a few key ones:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Install privacy-protecting plugins such as Privacy Badger on laptops and desktops and apps such as DuckDuckGo on mobile devices.<\/li>\n<li>Review what information different apps are collecting on mobile devices.<\/li>\n<li>Review and customize privacy settings. For example, here\u2019s how you can turn off tracking and targeted ads on:\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/myaccount.google.com\/data-and-privacy\">Google and YouTube<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/privacy\/checkup\/\">Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/support.tiktok.com\/en\/account-and-privacy\/personalized-ads-and-data\">TikTok<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Don\u2019t sign in to any apps or websites using your social network logins. You can also make secure and disposable email addresses using <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sharklasers.com\/\">SharkLasers<\/a> or <a href=\"https:\/\/proton.me\/mail\">ProtonMail<\/a> if you want to register for something without giving away your regular email address.<\/li>\n<li>Go into your devices\u2019 Settings and turn off apps\u2019 permission to access the camera, microphone and location.<\/li>\n<li>If you use iOS devices like iPhones or iPads, make sure to refuse data collection when installing new apps. If you use Android devices, install the DuckDuckGo app and turn on App Tracking Protection.<\/li>\n<li>Accept only the minimum required level of data collection on websites \u2013 first, by never clicking \u201cAccept All,\u201d and then by looking for phrases like \u201cReject All\u201d or \u201cOnly Necessary.\u201d<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-188\" src=\"https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploringstudent\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/13\/2024\/12\/Cookies-300x85.png\" alt=\"Five options for a website to collect cookies. They say: View Cookie Settings, Accept All Cookies, Allow All, Reject All, and Confirm My Choices.\" width=\"642\" height=\"182\" srcset=\"https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploringstudent\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/13\/2024\/12\/Cookies-300x85.png 300w, https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploringstudent\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/13\/2024\/12\/Cookies-65x18.png 65w, https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploringstudent\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/13\/2024\/12\/Cookies-225x64.png 225w, https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploringstudent\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/13\/2024\/12\/Cookies-350x99.png 350w, https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploringstudent\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/13\/2024\/12\/Cookies.png 588w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 642px) 100vw, 642px\" \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"menu_order":6,"template":"","meta":{"pb_show_title":"on","pb_short_title":"","pb_subtitle":"","pb_authors":[],"pb_section_license":""},"chapter-type":[],"contributor":[],"license":[],"class_list":["post-189","chapter","type-chapter","status-publish","hentry"],"part":177,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploringstudent\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/189","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploringstudent\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploringstudent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/chapter"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploringstudent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploringstudent\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/189\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":979,"href":"https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploringstudent\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/189\/revisions\/979"}],"part":[{"href":"https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploringstudent\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/parts\/177"}],"metadata":[{"href":"https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploringstudent\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/189\/metadata\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploringstudent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=189"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"chapter-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploringstudent\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapter-type?post=189"},{"taxonomy":"contributor","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploringstudent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/contributor?post=189"},{"taxonomy":"license","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploringstudent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/license?post=189"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}