July 16, 2020

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Author: Matthew Turner

The Myth of The Privacy

For some reason, many people think that the internet is a safe and free place where there are no cyber threats, censorship, and no one monitors users. However, the World Wide Web is a place where, in addition to finding any necessary information, you risk losing your data.

Thousands of internet providers, advertising, and even government agencies conduct round-the-clock surveillance of your actions and movements on the internet.

We Should All Be Concerned About Surveillance Online! Read the article and protect yourself right now.

This happens despite the laws of confidentiality of transmitted data, the policy of anonymity, and the freedom of action and speech rule.

Moreover, surveillance on the internet is even tougher than in offline life. After all, in the online space, tools are used for this purpose that reliably hides any prerequisites for surveillance.

Therefore, if you think that only people who commit illegal actions are tracked on the internet, you are mistaken. Just as you believe that your democratic country does not censor the internet and does not track your activities.

We’ve written more about in the article What Is The Issue With Internet Censorship. There, we’ve described the main points of internet censorship. Read the article and learn all about censorship.

It is unlikely that you will feel comfortable if you know that a big brother is watching you and knows all your actions to control you on the net. And all these tales about freedom and privacy are nothing more than the myth of privacy. There is always a third person between you and the global internet network.

The myth of privacy terms

First of all, you need to know a few terms to understand the issue better. 

ISP—is an internet service provider. It provides us with internet access.

IP—is your unique address, the address of your personal computer.

Cookies—are programs that copy your settings, activity, and preferences. Then, this data can be sent to the server or third parties.

So, now let’s consider the main topic of the article—the myth of online privacy.

5 Reasons Why Online Privacy Matters! Start your Internet protection right now.

The issue of the myth of internet privacy

What interferes with your privacy on the internet? Well, pretty much everything.

• Internet providers keep records of web page visits, including the time of the visit and the duration, and then transmit it.
• Search engines save all current queries, your IP address, time, location, and more. This information is stored in different ways. Yahoo—18 months, Google—9 months and Bing—6 months.
• Cookies that many sites send you. They help to make your online portrait.
• Mobile apps also track, collect, and store all your data about their usage.
• Emails are stored on servers. Such services can provide your data at any time for any request.
• Instant messaging apps are also not secure. Here, messages are also stored on the service servers, which can then be passed on to third parties on request.
• Is there the myth of privacy in social media? Social networks also can’t provide complete privacy. As a rule, they are tracking your web activity for advertising purposes.

Why Is Secure Messaging Important in 2020? Read the article and choose the best messaging app for daily chatting.

Above, we’ve listed only the main sources that make you reconsider your views on data privacy issues on the internet.

Thanks to new technologies, many sources were identified. And companies have developed a new method of monitoring like “fingerprinting”. Now all information from your computer is copied and identified using a unique tag (fingerprint) to track all internet activity in the future.

Such programs require your computer to draw a hidden image. Since each computer draws it differently, it will be identified a little differently. In other words, it is easy to identify your computer using this drawing.

In addition, a special technique “householding” scans the fingerprint from your computer, checks the IP address, and then determines all the devices that you used to surf the net.

What is the worst thing about it? This method is invisible. We can’t track when it happens or how to stop it. Therefore, this technique will most likely replace all traditional and well-known surveillance methods soon.

How to fight against myth of right to privacy?

There is a logical question: how to protect yourself from surveillance on the internet?

Fortunately, there are several ways for this. Some of them are more popular, others less. However, each of these methods will help protect you from online surveillance.

• Don’t use your search engine’s traditional email service. If you use the built-in email of your search engine, it will automatically connect to all your data and know about your preferences. This makes it easier for advertising agencies to set up targeted ads.
• Use DNT. Many modern browsers have a built-in “Do not track” function. However, you need to enable it manually, since many websites do not agree to its use, as it harms the site’s profit.
• Use anonymous browsers. No one can track your movements on the internet and use browsers with built-in anonymous usage function. For Example, Utopia. It is a decentralized and anonymous ecosystem with a built-in browser, messenger, email, wallet, and more.
• Use a VPN. Virtual parts of the network can reliably hide your identity. In addition, they will protect your data traffic. Using them, you will automatically change your location while physically being in a different location.

You can find more reliable methods to avoid online surveillance on the net in the article The Best Way To Protect Yourself From Invasion Of Privacy.

Note: Online privacy only exists as long as no one with the necessary skills has a good reason to track you.