Be cautious of your online privacy.
Photo: AJU

Study suggest Aussie websites are watching.

WEBSITES TRACKING YOU

The newest research by cybersecurity company NordVPN shows that Australian websites have 18 trackers on average. This is the fourth biggest result out of the 20 countries studied.

Digital media websites in Australia have even more — 29 trackers on average.

Next, come health websites with 25 trackers per website.

Streaming sites come into third place with an average of 23 trackers.

Porn and education websites are found to have the lowest degree of tracking, with five and four trackers, respectively, per website.

“The number of website trackers depends mostly on data-protection laws in a country. That is why in Central and Northern Europe, where GDPR rules are applied, websites have fewer trackers (13 per site). Australia’s Privacy Act is much more limited and only applies to a part of entities, which is why the number of trackers is also larger,” says Daniel Markuson, a digital privacy expert at NordVPN.

Researchers looked into the 100 most popular websites in 25 countries around the world. Using three different tracker blockers, they could see how many trackers (such as a cookie or a tracking pixel) those websites use to know more about their users.

WHY IS THIS DANGEROUS?

Trackers are usually inserted into the code of websites and are difficult to detect for a regular user.

The kinds of information trackers collect can include IP address and location, browsing history, a user’s clicks on a website, and what items they looked at and for how long as well as the data about the browser and device they’re using.

Trackers can help website admins improve users’ experience after analysing how visitors interact with their website. On the other hand, this information helps to create a user’s profile sold to third-parties (such as Google, Facebook, and Adobe).

They use the profile to serve more targeted and intrusive ads that follow users from website to website.

The worst case scenario is if cybercriminals get their hands on this data. They could compile a detailed portfolio about someone and use it against them in a phishing attack by crafting a highly personalised and believable message.

HOW TO AVOID

Take a smart approach to digital.
Photo: AIO

According to a survey by NordVPN, 48% of Australians worry about being tracked by social media giants (like Facebook), 45% are concerned that their data is collected by information and advertising aggregators (like Google), and 40% don’t want marketing agencies to get hold of their data.

Below, Daniel Markuson lists a number of ways users can become less trackable online:

Use a VPN. By using a VPN, you will hide your real IP address and location from all third parties, including your ISP, cybercriminals, network administrators, and advertisers.
Install tracker blocker. These stop your browser from collecting information about you and may also work as an ad blocker. Some tracker blockers, like NordVPN’s Threat Protection, offer other cybersecurity features, like malware protection.
Use privacy browsers. Get an internet browser specifically tailored for people with online privacy in mind: no auto-syncing, no spell-check, no auto-fill, and no plug-ins.
Ditch Google. Google tracks a lot of data about you — if you want to avoid that, you’ll have to opt for other email providers and search engines.

The methodology of the research can be found here.

ABOUT NORDVPN

NordVPN is the world’s most advanced VPN service provider used by over 14 million internet users worldwide. NordVPN provides double VPN encryption, malware blocking, and Onion Over VPN.

The product is very user-friendly, offers one of the best prices on the market, has over 5,000 servers in 60 countries worldwide, and is P2P-friendly. One of the key features of NordVPN is the zero-log policy.

For more information: nordvpn.com.