How Could Porn Streaming Websites Do With The Users' Data?

In 2018 and the following years, researchers have identified at least one company that tracks everything you do on the Internet at any time and is willing to take advantage of that data. Of course, this includes porn streaming websites.

A recent Quartz report pointed to a case involving MindGeek, a parent company of PornHub. On the MindGeek website does not display any information related to adult entertainment, it even looks like a typical website of other companies. But the company owns some famous pornographic sites and pornographic filmmakers. Thus, MindGeek is where it collects data about the habits and interests of porn viewers, thereby producing and offering sexually engaging content. This is the key to the success of MindGeek.

The user himself also provides the pornographic site with the necessary information and feedback. For example, users of PornHub must provide their name, date of birth and gender to sign up for a free account. Through that account, users can download videos to their devices, comment, or arrange their favorite video list, evaluate the video quality, and so on. And every user action taken on these sites are detailed in the same way as other social networking sites.

According to PornHub's privacy policy and other pornographic websites, it stores all cookies and IP addresses of users. This means that it records the location, access time, software and hardware used by the user to view the site. Then, they combine that data with those user activities on its websites. Include clicked videos, watched videos and watch time, ... especially what users search. Through it, pornographic websites can show which hours are usually viewed, which category, and how often.

MindGeek changes small aspects of the video to their metadata to get more out of the available data and attract more people to the site. This is a common practice that appears on the Internet, called A / B testing. According to Quartz, the conclusion of this test have given a lot of information and details based on their user preferences. This is also the method Netflix made to collect user feedback and improve its programs.

Popular businesses such as Facebook, Microsoft, and Google also regularly collect user data, but MindGeek claims it fully respects the privacy of its users and is very transparent about it. MindGeek has stated to Quartz that the company uses user data to bring porn content that is tailored to their interests and that it doesn't sell those data to any third party. To prove this and make people more comfortable while using its services, PornHub has frequently publicized its extensive test reports.

Not only does MindGeek know what you are doing on its web pages, but your web browser is also tracking all your activity. If you think the private browsing window keeps you safe from being monitored and recorded, then you're wrong. It does not do much except not saving the history of your recent activities on your device. Of course, the feature will give you a higher level of safety when someone accidentally checks your browser history, but it can not help you avoid being tracked by websites.

You can use anti-tracking software like DuckDuckGo, but you have to use a VPN to really protect your data.

It is not important that you try to prevent PornHub or other pornographic sites from tracking your actions and what you do on it. Ensure they do not know your true identity.