Ever wondered how you can protect your personal information from Facebook and Meta? It seems British-American host and comedian John Oliver has ideas.
In the latest episode of "Last Week Tonight," Oliver highlighted the massive changes over at Meta, but also how to prevent Meta from profiting over a user's data on Facebook and Instagram.
He ended up providing a guide created in collaboration with the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF).
How to Protect, Make Your Data 'Less Valuable' to Meta, Zuck
The "Last Week Tonight" show shared a couple of ways on how to prevent Meta from profiting over your data online.
According to Oliver, Meta's control over mainstream online media is massive, and the company can continue to effect significant changes, like its switch to Community Notes-like content moderation, as long as it is profiting from user data despite this leading to harm against users.
Towards the end of the episode, Oliver shared a URL, JohnOliverWantsYourRatErotica.com, which contains the step-by-step guide on how to "make your data less valuable" to Mark Zuckerberg and Meta.
Do not mind the name of the URL itself as it has nothing to do with rats or erotica. Instead, it contains a detailed guide on how to prevent Meta from accessing one's data and sharing it with third-party advertisers that help them earn revenue.
John Oliver and the EFF's Meta Data Protection Guide
The guide directs users to go to either the Facebook or Instagram account center to put into effect these advertisement and data protection methods. Oliver's website was made in collaboration with the EFF, which helped in creating the step-by-step guide on making one's data less appealing to Zuckerberg and Meta, preventing the company from earning profits.
Oliver's guide focuses on stopping Meta from giving users targeted ads based on the data collected from the account owner's activities on other apps and websites, and it also prevents Meta from sharing one's data to target you on other apps.
Moreover, users may also unlink their accounts from the data collected from other apps, which is later shared with Meta. The detailed guide from Oliver and the EFF claims that for users who have linked their accounts on Facebook and Instagram, they only have to change the settings on one platform and it will be applied to the other.
However, it if is unlinked, users would have to repeat the steps on the guide to also disable it on the other app.
Lastly, Oliver suggested that users should make a switch to privacy-centered browsers like Mozilla's Firefox and install browser extensions like the Privacy Badger that block advertisers and third parties from tracking their activities. There is also a guide on disabling phone advertising identifiers on iOS and Android.
