Mobilising the privacy tools available to us is key

Safer Internet Day serves as a reminder to us all – businesses and consumers alike – to stay vigilant when online. Today, so much of our personal information is constantly being collected, shared, and analysed across websites, apps, devices, and services. With malicious actors increasingly using sophisticated tactics to get their hands on this information, protecting it is of the upmost importance.

With the internet bleeding into almost every aspect of our personal and professional lives, staying safe online amid sophisticated threats is critical. To do this, individuals and organisations must limit what data we allow to be collected and processed by updating privacy and security settings on mobile apps, IoT devices and browsing online to our preferences. Particularly on the internet, all our activity is tracked through cookies, pixels, browsers, search engines, advertisers, etc. but we all can stop or limit this by using privacy focused browsers, ad blockers, anti-track tools or using a VPN, clearing cache and cookies, browsing in incognito mode, and limiting what you share online. These proactive steps will assist individuals in protecting their own personal data and dually better protecting organisational data including, of course, customer data.

It is extremely important that we all mobilise the significant privacy tools available to us in our online toolkits – through web browsers, applications, software, etc. – this will be key in creating safer online experiences.