Google, seemingly aware that people are unnerved by just how much ad networks know about us, today said it’s refining how it lets you control what ads you see. The company has updated its ad personalization settings page, and in the process, has kindly reminded us that it’s easy to turn off personalized ads altogether.
Like many Instagram users, I often scroll through my feed wondering why I’m not receiving more options to buy shit. Thankfully, Facebook’s constantly growing photo sharing app is looking out for me, the person whose endless appetite for special offers is instantly whetted by shaky cell phone footage. Today, Instagram…
Until now, purchasing some too-good-to-be-true cheap clothes or a weird smartphone case through a Facebook ad usually ends in disappointment, with no way to provide feedback about your new dress shirt that makes you look like a store brand anime character. While Facebook can’t stop you from buying a t-shirt with a few…
In the run-up to Friday’s launch of the new GDPR privacy protections, most of the focus has been on how it will affect huge data-mining tech giants like Google and Facebook. But as many people are finding out today, GDPR applies to any site that collects user data or, in the case of publishers like Gizmodo Media…
Facebook already has more data on most people than it knows what to do with but the company announced Thursday that it will need a few more vital pieces of personal information from anyone hoping to place political ads on its platform, including a government-issued ID and social security number.
It’s only been a few days since Oscar Mayer launched its horrendous “Bacoin” ad campaign, and a hero has come along in an attempt to kill it for good. Kirk Steele started a cryptocurrency called “Bacoin” a few years ago, and now he wants Oscar Mayer to cease-and-desist in conducting this viral travesty of a promotion.
Because all good things must come to an end, Mozilla has decided to follow through with its plan to insert ads into your sacred New Tab page, and it will be using Pocket—acquired in 2017—to do it. Luckily, Firefox users can take control of the situation with just a bit of effort.
Thousands of apps may be tracking the online activity of children in ways that violate US privacy laws, according to a recent survey of Android apps available on the Google Play store.
Among the unanswered questions at Mark Zuckerberg’s congressional hearings this week, the CEO was a bit stumped when asked if he would be willing to change Facebook’s business model in order to protect users’ privacy. Facebook’s data collection has received a lot of attention from a security perspective, but a new…
Netflix raised eyebrows with the $140 million budget it handed over to Martin Scorsese recently, but according to a Reuters report, it’s looking to pay out a lot more for some billboard real estate. The move could be seen as an escalation of its cold war with Hollywood.
Keeping with tradition, Apple has released an ad promoting its new iPad and educational tools for students and teachers after announcing the updated hardware and software during its education event. The heartwarming commercial is centered around “Group Three,” a cadre of five students who use an iPad to complete a…
Hundreds of thousands of demonstrators have churned out across the country on Saturday to support the March for Our Lives movement demanding action on gun control and that politicians begin standing up to the National Rifle Association. That movement is spearheaded by student survivors of mass shootings, particularly…
More bad news rattled the cryptocurrency markets on Wednesday. Google has announced that it will no longer allow cryptocurrency-related ads on its platforms. Prices fell as the news spread and a message from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) pushing for a global regulatory crackdown isn’t helping anything.
Humans assign value to brands. Brands represent wealth, strength, and yes, sex. We are our brands. And for some rhesus macaques in a lab, one brand, Adidas, represents monkey genitalia.
Facebook, which landed itself in the crosshairs after becoming one of the primary venues by which federal prosecutors allege a Kremlin-linked, pro-Donald Trump Russian operation called the Internet Research Agency tried to flood the US with disinformation and propaganda before the 2016 elections, now says it will…
The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s dream was explicitly not for everyone to drive around in expensive, gas-guzzling trucks, which should go without saying but everyone understandably felt the need to clarify to Ram and its parent company Chrysler after they aired a Super Bowl LII ad selectively quoting one of the…
It’s one of the most obnoxious and common experiences on the internet—you check out a product online, let’s say a new mattress, and then for weeks afterward, ads for the mattress stalk you around the internet, showing up on every website you visit. Maybe you decided to buy another mattress, or maybe you even bought…
Just like it’s gotten caught red-handed allowing landlords to tailor ads excluding potential tenants on the basis of race or ethnicity or anyone to purchase ads targeting groups like “Jew haters,” Facebook has apparently been helping dozens of companies target employment ads only to those supple, hard-working youths.
Hey, here’s a question for you. If a random stranger came up to you on the street and started asking you to tell them about who you’d like to be stuck in an elevator with or what your guilty pleasures are, do you think you would:
A new study by France’s Exodus Privacy and the Yale University Privacy lab has concluded that over three out of four of apps available on Google’s Play Store contain third-party tracking plugins, the Guardian reported on Tuesday. Apps sucking up personal information included some of the most popular ones on the…
