Privacy controls

Global Privacy Control

GPC is a signal your browser sends stating that you do not consent to the sale or sharing of your personal information. In several jurisdictions it carries legal weight. It is a single header — simple, and standardised.

Be clear about what it does: GPC expresses a preference. It does not technically prevent anything. Whether a company honours it happens on their servers, where you cannot observe it. Any tool telling you a site "agreed not to track you" is overstating what it can know.

Consent banners

Consent interfaces are frequently designed to make accepting easier than declining — the accept button is prominent, declining takes three clicks through a "legitimate interest" panel. That asymmetry is the dark pattern.

Genuinely essential cookies do not require consent, because the site cannot function without them. Anything described as "improving your experience" is usually optional, whatever the banner implies.

Private browsing, honestly

Private or incognito mode does not make you anonymous. It:

• Discards cookies and history when you close the window
• Keeps that session separate from your normal profile

It does not:

• Hide your IP address from sites, your network, or your ISP
• Prevent fingerprinting
• Stop a site knowing who you are once you log in

Site permissions

Location, camera, microphone, notifications, clipboard. Grant these per site, and revisit them — a permission granted once persists. Every browser exposes the current grants in the padlock or site-info menu beside the address bar, and notifications in particular are worth auditing.

A site asking for a permission is not automatically suspicious. A video call needs your camera. The question is whether the request matches what you are trying to do.

Last reviewed: 2026-09-12