Hide Your Online Shopping with a VPN

Shopping online to find the perfect Valentine’s Day gift for your partner? Perhaps you want to show them love with an edible bouquet, a dream vacation to Costa Rica, or a sparkling diamond necklace. Whatever it may be, you’re likely getting served up with ads based on your online shopping activity. And if you’re worried these ads will spoil the surprise, then we have the perfect solution to keep your Valentine’s Day shopping a secret. 

Before we dive into the tips and tricks, let’s walk through online shopping ads and how they mysteriously appear all over our browsers.

Why Do I Get Ads Based on My Shopping Activity?

Online data tracking has become more sophisticated, which has pushed digital ads to be worse than ever. Think about the last time you were browsing a few sites—maybe you were looking for a new pair of sunglasses or Bluetooth headphones. Before you know it, new sites on your web browser—that don’t even sell sunglasses or headphones—are flooded with intrusive ads relevant to your shopping activity. In the marketing world, this tactic is known as retargeting ads. Yet, we think a better term is stalker ads.

The root cause of online stalker ads is web cookies. Cookies collect data and information about your web browsing activity from the sites you land on. Marketing and advertising companies then use all your data to display creepy, targeted ads across your device. 

So, you must be wondering, “How do I prevent stalker ads on my device?” The answer—an ad blocker.

What is Ad Blocking?

Ad blockers provide the slick technology necessary to halt ads from loading on your web browser. They’re usually an app that comes in the form of a browser extension. When installed, the software sifts through domain names for advertising material and essentially ceases ads from loading on your screen.

An ad blocker is a perfect tool to keep your Valentine’s Day shopping a secret. And overall, will improve your web browsing experience by terminating stalker ads on your device.

Benefits of Using an Ad Blocker

In addition to its most obvious purpose, there are other benefits ad blockers provide. They can strengthen and heighten your online privacy, security, and speeds. It’s a quadruple win.

Privacy

For privacy benefits, ad blocking software keeps your online behavior private. This will prevent any third parties—e.g. marketing and tech companies—from collecting your data and attempting to monetize it.

Security

An ad blocker can also protect you from cyber attacks. Online criminals use digital ads as a weapon to lure in viewers and click through to malware. So, when you’re equipped with a reliable ad blocker, your device will be safe from cybercriminals attempting to scam you.

Faster speeds

An ad blocking app removes the ability for ads and third-party tracking to load on your device. No ads and tracking result in fast connection speeds since your device doesn’t have to use extra bandwidth to load the ads. In short, it lends itself to a better browsing experience.

Best VPN for Ad Blocking

There are dozens of options for ad blocking extensions. But, if you want the full book of benefits mentioned above, we recommend bundling your ad blocker with a premium VPN like Surfshark. A VPN can significantly enhance your online experience and keep your data private and secure.

Surfshark

Surfshark VPN has a reliable ad blocking feature, also known as  CleanWeb. CleanWeb halts stalker ads and malicious malware from loading on your device—which will then boost internet speeds and save data on your mobile. Surfshark is available on the devices below and offers its users unlimited connections, under one subscription.

Stay Secure

Data is money. And big tech companies are collecting it by the truckload to serve up highly targeted ads. As you’re online shopping around for gifts, don’t let these companies ruin your surprise. Sign up with a premium VPN that offers dependable ad blocking technology, so your partner is showered with a lovely surprise on Valentine’s Day.