Tracking

Tracking has become a huge topic of conversation in today's society, especially in regards to data privacy. As technology becomes more advanced and people present themselves online more and more, their safety is being compromised. Almost every site online or application people download on their devices has some sort of tracking component. Tracking is composed of things like location tracking, other forms of tracking by the site itself, or third-party sites that track users through the different sites they visit. Often, cookies are used by websites to store an ID for you on your device. When you return to a site, they use the cookie to identify you and give you targeted, segmented information (Angwin, 4). Arguably the biggest form of tracking is Location Tracking. It is used daily by websites, mobile devices, and most applications. Many devices and applications also track your personal data and information that you enter. Things like your email, phone number, address and other personal information are tracked and stored by the app. In order to combat that, many applications have developed that help users monitor the apps that are tracking them and what information they have. However, who knows what that monitoring application does with all the information it then gets about you? Tracking inception.

Additionally, some websites let you see what data they have on you in one big zip-file. Facebook allows users to download all the personal data Facebook has on them through their settings page on the user's profile. In the wake of Facebook's big data breach, many users have turned to downloading their personal Facebook data to see what data would have been released about them if they were involved in the Cambridge Analytica Scandal.

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