What you might not know is that most apps include third-party tracking services that monitor your activity on other apps and websites in order to show you targeted advertisements. But now you can stop the creepy behavior on your iPhone or Android phone????????
Apple has implemented App Tracking Transparency since its iOS 14.5, but Google has yet to implement the Privacy Sandbox announced earlier this year. This includes similar protection against app tracking.
On the other hand, there are several third-party apps like Rethink, NextDNS, and Blokada that can prevent apps from tracking user activity on other companies’ apps and websites.
The latest option comes from its DuckDuckGo, which has released a beta version of its free app tracking protection. feature???????? Like other apps, the browser uses Android VPN connection logs to monitor network activity. When an app tries to send data to a third-party service, the feature recognizes this intent and blocks the transfer.
Third party tracking companies use your information to create profiles. This profile is used by advertisers to display targeted advertisements. Furthermore, “tracking networks can sell data to other companies such as data brokers, advertisers and governments, and are more likely to engage in ideological manipulation, discrimination, price-fixing of individuals, polarization and more. It can do a lot of damage.” Now you know why you want to prevent trackers from getting your data.
Install or update DuckDuckGo
If you don’t have DuckDuckGo yet, install it from the Google Play Store. Or update it if it’s already on your Android device. Requires version 5.143.1 or later.
When you open the browser for the first time, it will ask you if you want to make it your default browser. This is not required to use App Policing feature???????? If you are using Android 13, you also have the option to grant or deny notification permissions. Allowing notifications has benefits that we’ll discuss later. open settings
With the DuckDuckGo browser open, open the floating menu (its three vertical dots), select Settings, scroll down and tap App Tracking Protection.
Enable app tracker
First, you get two pages of instructions explaining why you should use this feature and how it works. tap next button at the bottom of the first two pages to continue.
On page 3, DuckDuckGo emphasizes that App Tracking Protection is not a VPN (Virtual Private Network). Instead, it uses a local VPN connection so your data doesn’t go through an external server like a normal VPN.
Traditional VPNs encrypt all your traffic through their servers and securely reroute it, significantly slowing you down. DuckDuckGo’s VPN is local to your network and acts like a filter, looking for and blocking tracking requests on your blocklist as traffic passes through. Unfortunately, once your traffic passes DuckDuckGo’s app tracking protection, you can’t use a regular VPN for your traffic.