Targeted ADVERTISING

Yes, you were looking at those expensive sneakers online. Next thing you know, ads for them are showing up in your browser. On your favorite news sites. Hounding you to buy, buy, buy. Companies collect information about the sites you visit by using “cookies”— digital evidence you’re interested in their product—and then share your preferences with marketers. Clicking on the small X in the upper right of an ad will make it go away for the moment, but here are some longer-lasting fixes, according to the New York Times:

1 Clear your cookies. Apple, Google, and Microsoft all provide instructions on how to remove cookies from popular browsers such as Safari and Chrome. 2 Reset your advertising ID. Your Apple or Android phone assigns you an advertising ID to help marketers track you. You can find the reset button on an Android device inside the Google Settings app. On the iphone, the reset button is located under Settings in the Privacy menu, under Advertising. 3 Purge your ad history. Go to myactivity.google.com to find out what data Google has stored about you and delete what you want to get rid of. 4 Install an ad blocker. For browsers, try ublock Origin. On the iphone, you can try 1Blocker X. Note that Android users can block ads only by using a private browser, as Google banned ad blockers from its Play store. 5 Use a private browser on mobile devices. Try Firefox Focus, Duckduckgo, or Ghostery Privacy Browser, all of which have built-in ad and tracker blocking.