I worked agency-side in digital advertising for many years, and understanding how much of our data is collected and used can be frightening. I value my privacy and take every reasonable measure to limit my exposure to advertising and tracking. True privacy is nearly impossible nowadays, but we don’t have to make it easy. I block ads whenever possible and take an extra step or two to make my information slightly harder to get. These are some of my favorite tools and habits.
- Data broker removal – A number of companies offer this service. I’ve found that Easy Opt Outs provides the best bang for the buck at $20/year.
- VPN – A WireGuard VPN hosted on my homelab.
- Email – Fastmail. Paid email service that keeps your data private.
- Private server – A small server at home that hosts a number of services.
- Ad blocking / DNS – Control D is my favorite. I previously used NextDNS but migrated after a year.
- Password manager – Companies are hacked regularly, and data breaches are a normal part of everyday life. I’ve used 1Password for years and have found that it does a very good job. Its integration with Privacy.com is quite nice.
- Freeze all credit reports
- Opt out of credit solicitations – OptOutPrescreen.com
- Join the Do Not Call list – National Do Not Call Registry
- Web browser – Brave, with modifications, is my daily driver. Chrome is my dev browser, and Firefox is my backup.
- YouTube Premium – I use YouTube enough that the monthly fee is worth it to avoid sitting through long ads.
- Virtual credit cards – Privacy.com is great for this. I use virtual cards for services that are difficult to cancel, free trials, and anything slightly shady.
- Throwaway email addresses – A Fastmail subscription includes Masked Email. Randomly generated email addresses are used for newsletters, free trials, media logins, and other services. They can be discarded if they’re abused or no longer useful.
- Disposable phone numbers – Twilio is great for generating cheap burner numbers when you don’t want to give your real number to online services or random people.
- Personas – Alternate names and profiles, including email and physical addresses, for services that don’t require my real name. Persona details can be stored in 1Password for easy recall and form filling.
- Random physical addresses – A random address generator makes this easy.
- Unknown number blocking – Calls from numbers not in my contacts go straight to voicemail. This occasionally causes problems with doctors’ offices or other legitimate callers, but that’s not often the case.