{"id":109920,"date":"2018-10-01T09:44:36","date_gmt":"2018-10-01T09:44:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sftarticles.wpenginepowered.com\/en\/?p=109920"},"modified":"2025-07-01T22:58:53","modified_gmt":"2025-07-02T05:58:53","slug":"the-solution-to-preventing-global-internet-companies-from-selling-your-personal-life-without-your-permission","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/the-solution-to-preventing-global-internet-companies-from-selling-your-personal-life-without-your-permission\/","title":{"rendered":"The solution to preventing global Internet companies from selling your personal life without your permission"},"content":{"rendered":"

Large Internet based corporations are trading off our private data as if they were Pok\u00e9mon cards.<\/p>\n

Just a few days ago,\u00a0a secret deal between Google and MasterCard<\/a>\u00a0was unveiled whereby Google were paying MasterCard to obtain retail data on their client\u2019s transactions in the US. Google were then using this data to inform advertisers about whether users were buying their products in physical stores or online.<\/p>\n

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Google was quick to defend itself, and as expected, claimed \u201cwe do not have access to any personal information from our partners\u2019 customers\u201d. The company also commented that people could opt out of any Google led ad tracking from their Google account settings.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not the first time that Google has played their \u201cyou can opt-out of this feature whenever you like\u2026 and we will not be held responsible for informing you that such a feature exists\u201d card, nor will it be the last. As it happens in fact, just a few weeks ago, Google was forced to admit that\u00a0Google Maps tracks our location<\/a>, even if we explicitly ask it not to.<\/p>\n

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At the beginning of the year, the website “The Best of VPN” discovered that\u00a026 of the most popular VPN services have been collecting data on their paying users<\/a>, something which seems completely illogical if you think that VPN services were born out of the need to guarantee privacy and anonymity\u2026 not for collecting names, telephone numbers, email addresses, IP addresses\u2026and selling this information off in data packages.<\/p>\n

As users, our increasing paranoia surrounding this subject is more than justified. Fears about how the apps on our smartphone are listening to us have in fact become reality. In January, a\u00a0report from the New York Times<\/a>\u00a0revealed how more than 250 popular mobile gaming apps used your phone\u2019s microphone to listen to the adverts and programmes that users were watching on the TV. In June,\u00a0a similar story from Vice<\/a>\u00a0was released informing about how other more generic apps are also listening to us without our permission.<\/p>\n

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\r\n \"Three\r\n <\/div>\r\n
\r\n Three months of System Speedup free of charge<\/span>\r\n Download now <\/a>\r\n <\/div>\r\n
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Ultimately, the Internet has turned its users’ privacy into a commodity that can be exchanged for money. However, the biggest problem of all is the lack of transparency, and users are often treated like “fools”, assuming they will never realise what is really going on.<\/p>\n

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The situation forces users to take on responsibility for something that shouldn’t concern them and requires users to\u00a0constantly be\u00a0investigating whether the latest software they downloaded is going to auction off their private life or not. It’s both frustrating and unjust.<\/p>\n

Thankfully, some companies do strive for transparency and make a point of expressing how they work to ensure the privacy of their customers. These guarantees not only provide a small oasis of security amidst the arid desert of paranoia, but also save us lots of time when it comes to searching for trustworthy programs.<\/p>\n

One of the most recent examples of transparency is Avira and their PC Avira System Speedup tool, designed to\u00a0clean up and optimise your PC. In August, we saw yet another well known clean-up tool join the long list of companies found guilty of playing around with user’s personal data, proving that we should also be wary of these types of programs. Avira, on the contrary, took the opportunity to clarify their good intentions surrounding this subject:<\/p>\n

Travis Witteveen, CEO of Avira recently declared \u201cit is our duty to protect users, not only against malware but also against the loss of online privacy. Users should be able to remain as anonymous as they like and we need to stop app and software companies from constantly stealing and using user’s personal information without their permission.”<\/p>\n

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Avira System Speedup works to pro-actively defend our security, keeping untrustworthy programs at bay. The clean-up and optimiser tool deletes all personal information that may have been stored by over 2500 apps, in addition to removing all traces of websites you have visited, or videos you may have watched… This way, offending companies are unable to use your data to make decisions on what adverts they show you, and hackers will not be able to gain access to your PC.<\/p>\n

Avira System Speedup prioritises the user in every possible respect, not just when it comes to privacy. Upon opening the program, the interface clearly displays the current state of your computer and alerts you to any potential vulnerabilities (your hard-drive is about to explode!), and notifies you of any available solutions, such as cleaning up your hard-drive. The software includes a feature for speeding up gameplay, which is ideal for today\u2019s gamers who can’t tolerate even the slightest of slowdown. You will also receive notifications, for example alerting you if the speed of your PC start-up can be improved. All of these services are available to users at just the click of a button.<\/p>\n

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If your PC is slow to start-up, if your hard-drive is full, if watching the match online becomes tedious due to slow buffering… we recommend Avira System Speedup. Not only is it efficient, but it’s also 100% secure and pro-user. Thanks to these types of programs, you can now protect yourself against other harmful\u00a0companies\u00a0who may try to spy on you and sell your private information.<\/p>\n

If you’re still not convinced (and given the recent revelations about online security, it’s not surprising), we suggest your give the Avira System Speedup free trial a go, and see for yourself how your computer will be cleaned-up from unnecessary files and prying eyes.\u00a0Click this link to request a free three-month trial<\/a>.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Large Internet based corporations are trading off our private data as if they were Pok\u00e9mon cards. Just a few days ago,\u00a0a secret deal between Google and MasterCard\u00a0was unveiled whereby Google were paying MasterCard to obtain retail data on their client\u2019s transactions in the US. Google were then using this data to inform advertisers about whether … Continue reading “The solution to preventing global Internet companies from selling your personal life without your permission”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9075,"featured_media":110810,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","wpcf-pageviews":0},"categories":[2441],"tags":[],"usertag":[],"vertical":[],"content-category":[],"class_list":["post-109920","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-how-to"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109920","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9075"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=109920"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109920\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":327307,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109920\/revisions\/327307"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/110810"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=109920"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=109920"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=109920"},{"taxonomy":"usertag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/usertag?post=109920"},{"taxonomy":"vertical","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/vertical?post=109920"},{"taxonomy":"content-category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/content-category?post=109920"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}