One of the fundamental premises of Apple is to guarantee the security and privacy of its users. In fact, this has been the main axis of numerous campaigns that have been carried out with equipment such as the iPhone. In this article we tell you how to change the privacy settings of iOS, so that you can be the one who controls everything about the tracking of your navigation.
What is your browsing data usually used for?
This is not really a cybersecurity article, nothing is further from the truth. In later sections we want to tell you how to access and change Safari settings in this regard, but first we think it is convenient for you to have a slight idea of where your data can go.
The first thing is that, unless you enter a page of doubtful trust, aspects such as your address or credit card number are safe. However, there are certain data that are of interest to many companies, such as your residence location or the one you usually travel, as well as your browsing habits . That is, if you usually frequent websites for buying and selling a type of product, if you like video games and visit specialized forums, and so on.
This is encompassed within the so-called Big Data, a complex system that can be used to write one or more books, but which is ultimately the composition of data at a global level that certain marketing companies handle. These collect your browsing data or cookies and anonymously analyze your interests to, based on this, offer you personalized advertising. Surely you have ever been looking for a product on the internet and after a while an advertising banner for that same product has appeared, as rare as it was. Well, this is what it basically serves and despite the fact that it seems to be something anecdotal, it moves huge masses of money. Your data is valuable to companies and therefore they try to obtain the necessary permissions to access it.
Settings that Safari has for privacy
If you go to Settings> Safari you will be able to find a multitude of settings, among which the possibility of choosing your default browser stands out, if you want to receive search suggestions and more interesting aspects, but that do not have to do with privacy. However, in this same section you will also find the privacy functions that we comment on, sliding down and going to the section called “Privacy and security” (worth the redundancy). There you will find the following:
- Prevent cross-site tracking
- Block all cookies
- Fraudulent website notice
- Check Apple Pay
If you also go below and click on ” Advanced ” you will be able to find a section in which to consult the data of the websites you visit. In them will appear an amount of space (generally in MB) that represents the amount of data that these sites store about your browsing. You can delete them all by clicking on the red button that says ” Delete all data “.
You will see that also in the “Advanced” tab other functions appear such as “Experimental Features” and more that, unless you have specific knowledge on the subject, we recommend that you do not touch to avoid problems. What interests you is in the other parts already commented.
Safari web inspector
If you have an iPhone with iOS 14 or later you will have an improved version of Safari that includes an interesting privacy function called Web Inspector. This is a tool that informs you about the data collected by the different websites you visit. To access it you must be on the page, press the ” Aa ” icon and then on ” Privacy report “.
This section also informs you of some browser functions that prevent trackers from locating you, as well as the number of times the security system has had to act to prevent it. In addition to, as we have already said, the data related to the tracking made of you by the web pages you visit, being able to have specific data of the origin of these.
