Sometimes I look at a privacy setting and wonder who would ever allow that? Why would someone want to provide that much personal information to total strangers or to some large Internet company?
App makers sometimes like to test the limits to see what they can get away with, before users decide to turn off a feature because they aren’t comfortable with the amount of personal data being provided, or the audience that it’s being shared with.
We’ve compiled a list of the top 8 privacy settings that make us scratch our heads and wonder why anyone would leave them turned on:
Here Are The Top 8 Worst Privacy Settings to Leave Enabled:
1. Geotagging pictures (Your Phone’s Camera App)
Here’s a bright idea: let’s tag every picture we take on our phone with the precise GPS coordinates of where the photo was taken and embed the data in the picture.
What could possibly go wrong?
Lot’s of things could go wrong. Stalkers could find out where you live by reading the metadata from a picture you posted online for one thing. You should consider turning off this feature at the source (in your camera’s app settings). If you have pictures that already have this data in them, Check out our article: How to Remove Geotags From Your Photos.
2. Facebook’s Nearby Friends Location Sharing “Until I Stop” Setting
You know what I really want to do? I want to tell my friends my exact location and then I want to lock the setting so that it allows for constant updates. Sounds like a great idea, right? Maybe not.
If you don’t find the prospect of letting your friends know where you are all the time then you may want to make sure your phone’s Facebook App isn’t allowing this type of thing. Click on the compass icon next to someone you’ve shared your location with in the Nearby Friends section of the app and make sure the “Until I Stop” option is not checked.
3. Access to Your Phone’s Microphone
Some apps request access to your phone’s internal microphone to perform certain tasks. We find this feature to be creepy. On the iPhone there is no sub-setting to only allow access while the app is in use, so it’s hard to know when the app is actually using the microphone, which is also a concern.
4. Photo Stream Syncing on All Devices
While you might not think of photo stream synching as a privacy issue, the first time you take a provocative selfie and it ends up synching to your Apple TV in the livingroom and shows up on the screensaver while Grandma had paused a movie, you’ll realize that this feature has privacy implications.
You may want to turn this feature off if you have a lot of devices that share the same iCloud account and could potentially end up in the wrong hands. Read our article: How to Secure Your Racy Photos for some tips on avoiding the situation described above.
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