Hi all, hope everyone is doing well.

I think this is just on Face book but am not sure, I know I am tracked on line because I have had ads referring to posts I made on forums. Something to do about that was suggested here but I either got lazy and didn't follow through or else my computer was so gimpy I didn't want to annoy it further.

Can supermarkets also do this? I bought a somewhat obscure personal care item and ads showed up. I shopped at Safeway last week which is unusual for me and now I have ads for Safeway. I normally shop at Fred Meyer (Kroger) and a horse rescue site I follow today had requests for Kroger shoppers to sign up for a program that donates money from purchases, i have not seen either of the latter 2 before. I think there have been some other instances but I assumed it was coincidence.

I am a little creeped out by this, am I losing my mind or is the evil Big Food
intruding on my privacy. Did they start selling info from your store card to FB?

judi

This is called data mining. There is a Firefox feature that will block your activity from being snooped on:

Click file in Firefox, and the third choice down, is browse privately.

Jo knows more about this than I do.

Big handbags and furniture were watching me for a while. I guess it was connected to my searches in google and in ebay.

There's another thread here on computers and technology that may be of assistance. I ended up fixing my settings on Google and as well I added Adblock Plus on advice from other members and it works fine. No more of those stalking advertisements.

http://neurotalk.psychcentral.com/thread217778.html

I have an unusual thing to report about the data mining.

I get massive ads based on my Ebay activity... art supplies etc.

But yesterday I had on Facebook an ad for Military Veterans clothing.
My hubby wore out his old fishing cap this summer...which he used for a boonie hat (from Vietnam)... his old Boonie hat died
years ago. And low and behold there was an ad for a Boonie hat..
olive drab 1/2 off and free shipping. I certainly wasn't looking for one yet and neither was he. But it popped up on my Angry Birds game, and we bought one! So the price was right and we are rather amazed that something actually worked for us this way!

Serendipity.

You are right, Lara.... I have lots of coincidences in my life like this.

Besides browser add ons, I use the more private search engines.. non tracking..
in this post-
http://neurotalk.psychcentral.com/post1131079-5.html

how to block tracking cookies- results by duckduckgo privacy search -
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=how+to+blo...g+cookies&t=lm

MrsD,

Your computer and the Net is now reading your mind…

Dave.

Your google search history is recorded in your web browser's database; it can be read by websites and thus you'll see banner ads based on your browsing history. See the following article on stopping targeted advertising:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/0..._n_828289.html

Thanks everyone, at least I can block the sneaky weasels. It isn't just FB, I was on a horse racing site today and got an ad for something I buy.

I'm not getting these from web browsing, its from what I buy from the store, I haven't looked any of the items up online. I am trying to remember if I have ever given them my email address but cannot. I generally don't because I don't have a printer to use for coupons but it is possible I had a weak moment. It is either that or they sold my info to some marketing company. I don't get any emails from them though.

I couldn't find anything on line except this and I don't know how credible it is.


http://www.theguardian.com/money/201...-get-your-data


I also found a horrid article that really appeared true about Target designing a computer analysis to try to identify pregnant women in their second or third trimester so they could manipulate their buying habits before the birth of the child to establish habits and scarf up on all the new purchases a child would entail and it worked. I was a psyc major and what it said they did sounded plausible.

I am already annoyed with Freddie's because recently they have been spraying their organic produce so heavily its a soggy mess so I think I will bring this up too. Should I wear a tin foil hat? Mrd D had either of you mentioned the Boonie hat online?


Thanks again gurus of all things mysterious and technological.

judi