A plain-English guide to online privacy

Online privacy is one of those topics where the conversation swings between "you have nothing to hide" and "install Tor and delete your accounts." Neither is useful. Here's a middle-of-the-road, non-paranoid guide to what privacy actually means in 2026 and what to do about it.

Privacy vs anonymity vs secrecy

These three keep getting collapsed and they're different. Privacy is choosing who knows what. Anonymity is choosing whether your identity is attached to what you do. Secrecy is choosing whether an act happens at all in a visible way. You can have any one without the others.

The three big leaks

Most of what people call "privacy problems" reduces to three sources:

• Accounts. Every signup ties your activity to an identity a company can sell, share or lose.
• Trackers. Third-party scripts on websites correlate your browsing across sites.
• Voluntary sharing. The things you put on public profiles, forever.

All three are addressable without becoming a hermit.

Accounts: use fewer of them

The best privacy move is not creating an account you don't need. Anonymous services — chat, search, some maps — do most of the same jobs without the identity strap. When you do need an account, use email aliases so different services can't be joined at the identity level.

Trackers: use a good browser

Modern browsers block most trackers by default if you turn on the privacy settings that ship in the box. Firefox and Safari do this well without extensions. If you want more, a content blocker like uBlock Origin covers almost everything you'd care about.

Voluntary sharing: think about permanence

The thing you post today is search-indexable in ten years. Not everything you write needs to be attached to your real name forever. Anonymous or pseudonymous spaces exist for the half-formed thoughts, the questions you're embarrassed to ask, the interests you're not ready to advertise.

What "we don't collect anything" actually means

When a service claims privacy, ask three questions: What data do you collect? Where does it go? How long do you keep it? Vague answers are the tell. "We don't sell your data" is easy to say and easy to route around. "We don't have it" is harder to fake.

The rules of thumb

• Assume anything you type into a text box could be public one day.
• Prefer services that ask for less over ones that ask for more.
• Anonymous is fine for conversations; identified is fine for banking; the mistake is mixing the two.
• Your future self has different opinions than your current self. Give them room to change.

The good news

Privacy in 2026 is easier than it was in 2020. Browsers are better. Alternatives exist. You don't have to give up the internet to get a large fraction of it back — you just have to make a handful of intentional choices about where to spend identity and where to keep it in your pocket.