Is Everyone Tracking Me Online?
How can companies track you and what can you do against it?
This is a very common question people ask technical experts and almost always, the answer is the same — they can if they want to. This is scary, obviously. However, some companies do a lot to track your every cyber move, sometimes even when you’re not on their website. You have to assume that these people are working day and night to make sure their path to reach you is clear and you are completely visible to them. This is because the market is huge for people’s personal information, and there’s big money they can earn through specific ads. This is even scarier than what I’ve said before but, don’t worry, there are ways to make sure you’re as safe as possible.
Before we get into the different ways one can stay safe, let’s take a look at the few ways that people can access your information and make your online presence unsafe.
Common Ways to Be Hacked
IP Addresses
The most basic way to identify a person on the internet is by using their IP address. With an IP address, scammers can do a whole lot. They can find your general location, not pinpointed, but a specific area or city. IP addresses change a lot over time, and there could be someone out there that has the same IP address as well, but this information can be dangerous if combined with other techniques.
Mouse tracking
Mouse tracking is often used by companies to distinguish between bots and real people. You would think that scammers and hackers would have no use for this but in reality, mouse tracking is more common than one would think. Website owners and advertisers track your mouse movements to see who’s interacting with the website. This allows them to spot real users and trace their IP addresses from it.
HTTP Referrers
When you load a new website, your browsers send a bunch of information to that website server. This information includes where you come from. Every advertiser wants to know how a person found their website. With this information, they can help engage with their audience better. This information is contained in the HTTP Referrer header.
“Web Bugs” are single-pixel images on your screen which take advantage of the header to track you. Because of their size, they’re practically invisible to the naked eye.
Cookies
I’ve written an entire article on what cookies are and if they’re harmful or not, you can check it out here.
Cookies are basically very small files that are stored on your device for a specific amount of time after you visit a website. They contain your log-in data or any relevant information that can assist a website to be tailored to your needs. They’re probably the most common way of tracking people online. This is because the third-party cookies, the problematic ones, stay for a long period and across many pages.
There are some other ways that websites and people can track you online, but these are some of the most commonly used methods. Enough about the bad stuff, let’s talk about how you can avoid this as much as possible.
Before we get started, I should say one thing — none of these methods will keep you 100% safe. As I mentioned at the very beginning, hackers and scammers are working day and night to make you vulnerable and keep you under threat.
How to Be safe
Delete your cookies
If you really want to be safe from online tracking, the simplest way would be to delete your cookies after you visit a website. Using a cookie to keep your social media open is like leaving your door open so that you don’t have to use the key to open and close it every time. You can manually clear your cookies by going to the browser’s settings. Along with this, you can also set your browser to never allow any cookies without permissions and to automatically delete them when created.
Avoid Big Search Engines
Big search engines learn a lot about you when you use them. Google Chrome and Firefox have alternative options to the traditional search engines that do not track your behavior and choices online.
Mask Your Browser Signature
When you go to a new website, there’s some information passed on from your browser to the website. This includes something known as a user agent string. This string tells the website owner what operating system you’re using as well as your browser version.
There exist several extensions for Chrome and Firefox alike to change your user agent string on the fly. This will make it harder to track you.
Use a VPN
VPN stands for a Virtual Private Network. When you use a VPN, a secure network is established between you and the internet even when you’re using a public internet connection. This secure network provides you with privacy and anonymity while you surf the web. Your IP address is hidden when you connect using a VPN service. In addition to this, when you connect via a server in the UK, you will have a UK IP address.
At the end of the day, if someone really wants to track you, they can. So if you’re super scared of that happening, then you should probably restrict your use of social media and use burner phones and laptops. But if you’re more concerned with staying safe in your every day life, then these few methods mentioned above should cover you just fine.
Thank You for Reading!
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Inheaden is a young IT and software startup based in Darmstadt, Germany. As an “Idea and Tech Factory”, we have set out to be a driving force of innovation, digitization, and automation with a focus on the areas of services, products, and research. Under the Inheaden brand, we work on individual “high performance” software solutions that bring a change. Modern designs, innovative technology approaches, and IT security for our partners and customers are important components of our work profile.
