2

I was looking for a tablet from my home PC on Amazon and sometimes I find Amazon ads on Facebook which contain suggestions related to my search criteria; I never worried too much as I thought the Amazon ads were just frames to their website which can access my cookies and recognise me.

I started worrying when I saw the same Amazon ads from my office PC where I never logged into Amazon and I never searched anything. Is it legal for Facebook and Amazon to share my data?

I never mentioned a tablet in my Facebook conversations so Facebook itself cannot have processed my preferences and built the ads.

Improve this question
2
  • This may be better suited to Information Security.
    – ale
    May 27, 2016 at 18:56
  • I think you are right, I wasn't sure as it looked more technical rather than "legal".
    – Stefano d'Antonio
    May 27, 2016 at 19:16

2 Answers 2

Reset to default
1

I've seen this happen as well. What I do to avoid this is to avoid the ads being put on the sites. Each ad added to the page uses cookies and other forms of tracking in order to keep track of what your are ordering in order to pass this information to other sites. This in fact is a large business. While they might find it useful, it obviously affects us customers because of the fact that they are passing information to other companies about what we are browsing. In order to avoid this install AdBlock Plus to your browsers.

In order to do this you'll want to go to the extensions in whatever browser you are using ad search for AdBlock Plus and install it.

After installing, go into the AdBlock Plus Options and go to the filters. Each browser is a little different. Add the following filters to remove most of the ads you are getting.

AdBlock Warning Removal List EasyList Malware Domains EasyPrivacy

This should take care of your problem. I no longer have issues finding my products tracked across sites after I started using AdBlock Plus and using these filters.

Improve this answer
0

What I gather from the interest-based ads policy pages of Facebook and Amazon is that they are both associated with the Digital Advertising Alliance & follow the same modus operandi. To avoid seeing the interest-based ads that Facebook and Amazon serve, you'd to have to visit the Advertising Preferences settings page on those sites to change your preferences.

The list of "Companies Participating with the DAA" is quite large

Improve this answer

Your Answer

By clicking “Post Your Answer”, you agree to our terms of service and acknowledge that you have read and understand our privacy policy and code of conduct.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.