Top 10 Creepy Websites That Know Everything About You

The websites you visit monitor your activities, including the words you choose to search for an item, what results you click on, how much time you spend on a web page, along with the operating system, location, IP address, your interests, gender and many other details about you and the device you are using. These Creepy websites know more about you than perhaps your closest friends, and that’s very concerning.

Also, read: 10 Best Chrome Extensions To Protect Your Online Privacy & Security

People used to browse the internet without the fear of being watched. The key word here is “used to.” Today, internet browsing is no longer private, and most people can attest that online privacy has become a myth. When you search for a product online, do you ever wonder why you keep on seeing ads about the product or anything related to it even days after your initial search?

It’s like having someone looking over your shoulder while you browse the internet, which is very irritating and quite creepy. We listed the top 10 creepiest websites that know everything about you. You might be surprised at the wealth of information these websites have about you and your browsing habits.

1. Google

Google knows so many things about almost every internet user since it is the most used website. When you use its products such as Gmail, Google maps and Google search it is safe to say that Google knows everything about you. Below is the information Google collects and stores, in the guise of making their services better for end users like us.

Personal Information

You can check all the personal information Google has about you by going to the Google Personal Information page. The page includes your name, age, gender, and birth date. Your contact details are also there especially if you placed your phone number as an account recovery option. Google knows your phone number and the other email addresses that you linked to your Google account.

How to block or limit information: You can always change your personal information to unreal data. You can go under a pseudonym and use a false birthday and gender. You can also choose which information to share to your Google+ circle by clicking on the Go to “About Me” link at the bottom of the page.

Ads You’re Interested In

Go to Manage Ad Settings to see all the topics that Google thinks you’re interested in based on your age, gender, and browsing history.

How to block or limit information: Toggle Ad personalization to Off to stop Google from creating an ad profile for you. You will still see ads, but they won’t be based on your browsing history. You may also choose just to turn off ads from specific advertisers.

Location History

Google knows the places you’ve been to and the places you’re planning to visit. You can go to the Google Location History page to see what areas Google has stored. You will also see your home and work address on the page if you added this information before.

Google also has a Reservations page where you can see the places, flight, hotels, and restaurant reservations you’ve had in the past.

How to block or limit information: Aside from deleting your home and work address, you can turn off location history by going to Activity Controls > Location and turning off Location History.

To delete a place, you need to remove the email related to it.

Browsing History and Activity

Google also knows the websites you visited, how long you spent on those sites and virtually all of your online activities. You can view all the details in the Google My Activity page where you can view your events in bundle view or item view.

How to block or limit information: You can delete the activities one by one by clicking on the three dots on the right side of each event, or you can go to the left pane and select the “Delete activity by” option. You can delete by date or by product.

Voice and Audio Activity

Google knows your voice and your voice searches from when you used Google Assistant. You can go to Voice & Audio Activity > Manage Activity to see your usage history of Google Assistant. You will be able to play all voice searches stored there, which is quite creepy.

How to block or limit information: like how you delete browsing history, you can delete voice activities one by one by clicking on the three dots on the right side of each event, or you can go to the left pane and select the “Delete activity by” option. You can delete by date or by product.

Device Information

Details about your device including operating system, device settings, and your IP address are also being monitored and stored by Google. Go to the Device Information page to see how much Google knows about the devices you’ve used.

How to block or limit information: like how you delete browsing history and voice activities, you can delete device information one by one by clicking on the three dots on the right side of each event, or you can go to the left pane and select the “Delete activity by” option. You can delete by date or by product.

2. Facebook

Right from when you sign up for Facebook, you already volunteer your name, gender, email address or phone number, and date of birth. All your activities on the social networking site will then be tracked including the following:

All other information you volunteer such as school, workplace, hometown, current city, maiden name, groups, and associations.
The ads you click.
The IP address used when logging into Facebook.
All the friends you’ve added, and even those you already deleted.
All of your likes, shares, clicks from the very first day of your Facebook account.
Your IP and location.

Also note that third-party apps can access all your information and may even sell these data, according to reports that say personal data from Facebook are being sold for $5 to as much as $250 each.

Also, read: Facebook Security Tips You Need to Implement Today

How to block or limit information: you can prevent third-party apps from linking to your Facebook account by going to Apps, click on edit, and turn off third-party API access. You can also block Facebook from tracking your location by turning off location tracking on your Android or iPhone. On your phone, you can open the specific app settings and deny location permission.

3. YouTube

Google owns YouTube so it uses the same trackers that its parent company uses. As such, the information collected through YouTube is included in the data you’ll see on Google. These data include:

Personal information such as your name, gender, age, email address, and just about everything you volunteered when you signed up for a YouTube account.
Ads you’re interested.
Location history
Browsing history
Device information

To limit YouTube’s data collection, you can do the same things mention under the Google subtopic in this article.

Location History

Google also has a Reservations page where you can see the places, flight, hotels, and restaurant reservations you’ve had in the past.

How to block or limit information: Aside from deleting your home and work address, you can turn off location history by going to Activity Controls > Location and turning off Location History.

To delete a place, you need to remove the email related to it.

Browsing History and Activity

Google also knows the websites you visited, how long you spent on those sites, and virtually all of your online activities. You can view all the details in the Google My Activity page where you can view your events in bundle view or item view.

Voice and Audio Activity

Device Information

How to block or limit information: like how you delete browsing history and voice activities, you can delete device information one by one by clicking on the three dots on the right side of each activity, or you can go to the left pane and select the “Delete activity by” option. You can delete by date or by product.

4. Clickclickclick.click

The internet is watching your every move. By visiting several sites daily, you gave the internet a lot of personal information. The data of the sites you visited, the images you searched, videos you watched, and much more content can be listed on this website.

Clickclickclick.click commands you to do specific tasks on their website every time you visit. It can even detect whenever you want to leave. You can also have a collection of all the cookies and data being used on their website. This site documents your actions.

How to block or limit information: Use anti-tracker browser extensions like Ghostery to stop websites from tracking your every move.

5.True People Search

The True People Search is a website that prompts its users to search for a person’s personal information using a name and a zip code. Using this bit of information, everyone can find out a person’s phone number, current and previous addresses, age, and relatives.

The details gathered from the site are spread out publicly to give easy and accessible information to everyone. The True People Search’s main objective is to find lost friends and family members in a hassle free way.

How to block or limit information: If you find your information on the website, you can request for it to be removed by going to https://www.truepeoplesearch.com/removal. And since True People Search gathers information through apps, be careful when signing up for an app. If possible, use a dummy email account and a fake name.

6. Predictive World

Oversharing is not a good habit. On the internet, you tend to give out information that should be kept within yourself. Technology has made life easier but trusting it too much can harm you so severely.

Predictive World is a website that lets you input your info and records everything you do. It is a creepy website that can even predict your future. All you need to do is to sign in to your Facebook account then it will get all your information with the help of your profile. The predictive world offers random assumptions and expectations about your life in the near future.

How to block or limit information: The website gets information from Facebook, so limiting what you disclose in your Facebook profile will also restrict what Predictive World will know about you.

7. FamilyTreeNow.com

This site is becoming more and more popular as they attract people faster compared to other sites. FamilyTreeNow is a website that lets you provide personal information so that they can trace your bloodline and lets everyone know about you. The FamilyTreeNow researches your family lineage. And because they knew a lot about you, this will also give a significant impact on other people.

This website has a list of your previous and present home addresses, your phone number, birth and death records, and many more. What makes this site more alluring is it doesn’t require any fees when you register. It is terrifying since it gives everyone your personal information so readily.

The advantage of this website is that you can get to know a part of your identity, your family history, and your family relations. The terrifying part is sick-minded can quickly harass or threaten you by using your information.

How to block or limit information: According to The Outline, FamilyTreeNow.com gets information from government records such as documents related to birth, marriage, divorce, and other court cases, and death. For this reason, it’s challenging to limit the information this website gathers since most of our records are publicly available. Thankfully, you can opt out from FamilyTreeNow.com. You need to wait for 48 hours for the removal request to take effect.

8. TruthFinder

Most people use Google to find information about anyone. But did you know that there is a website which gives you information that even Google doesn’t know? The website is called TruthFinder. At this time, TruthFinder is giving out information about the millions of citizens of America which makes it a disturbing site.

When you visit this site, all you need to do is to input your name (or other person’s name), city, and state. After that, the website will load and gather information. TruthFinder will show you sensitive personal data such as criminal records which is shocking.

How to block or limit information: Like the FamilyTreeNow, TruthFinder states that “We generate TruthFinder reports by collecting data from local, state, federal, and independent sources.” TruthFinder provides a way for people to remove their information on their website. Go to their opt out page and follow the instructions stated there and wait for 48 hours.

9. 23andMe

This website is kind of similar to FamilyTreeNow.com. 23andMe captivates people with the promise of sharing them about their family heritage and any possible hereditary diseases. While this site has promised thousands of its users not to sell any of their personal information, we will never know. Any data online is potentially open to data leaks and breaches, meaning there is a big chance that some confidential information could be thrown out to the world.

Finally, it is better sometimes to keep some family secrets and ancestral histories hidden than finding out everything about it.

How to block or limit information: To define what 23andMe knows about you, don’t disclose your medical records to them. Better yet, don’t use their DNA services since they are sharing your genetic data with a GlaxoSmithKline (GSK).

10. Webkay.robinlinus.com

Web key is a site that can guess your gender and educational background easily. This website will tell you that it knows everything about your search history without any consent. It can even detect what type of data you are using and can also save some of your personal information in case of future leakage. There is also a click option from the site that can tell who is collecting your data. The information being gathered will be stored in their servers.

How to block or limit information: Webkay.robinlinus.com reflects what your browser knows about you, so the most effective way to limit this is to use browsers and search engines that respect your privacy. You may also go here to find out how to stop websites from tracking you on Google Chrome.

Don’t Allow These Creepy Websites To Invade Your Privacy

There is a big possibility that your favorite site is keeping all your data. Some of them might even know your sensitive information like your interests, identity, where you’ve been, and what you’re doing. They can also tell what browser you are using and the brand of the device that you used while browsing.

For a private online experience, it is best to use a VPN in conjunction with private browsers like TOR, Brave or Cliqz and DuckDuckGo search engine instead of Google.

With a VPN you protect your devices from internet provider monitoring and websites cannot track you since your identity, IP address, and DNS are all hidden behind the VPN server’s IP address. Aside from this, a VPN encrypts your online activity and traffic providing you the privacy and security that you truly deserve. A VPN further allows you to do what you want privately and safely:

Download torrents privately.
Access adult content, dating sites, forbidden and stolen contents, warez, online casino, and gambling, betting – all privately.
Access restricted websites in countries that have strict Internet censorship.
Browse privately at work and unblock sites at school.
Counter government surveillance and circumvent cenzorship.
Prevent hackers and cyberstalkers from getting into your system.

Take Responsibility for Your Privacy

In addition to using a VPN, here are some tips in making sure that websites won’t have any personal information about you:

Be conscious of what you share on social media. Sites and people with bad intentions can only get the information that you volunteer.
Block websites from tracking you. Use anti-trackers like Ghostery or Privacy Badger, ad-blockers like StopAD and private browsers like Tor or Brave.
Don’t use personal information when signing up for any website. You can use a pseudonym and a fake or masked email address instead. To get masked emails — use services like joinesty.com or figleafapp.com
Don’t reuse your passwords for all accounts. One password = one website. Same stands for emails alternative masked emails for each account. That will protect yourself from data breaches.
Monitor for data breaches and fix your leaked accounts. Use FireFox Monitor to see your breached accounts. Use a private DNS service like FreeDNS or OpenDNS to secure yourself from DNS monitoring and leaks.

Neha Shelar

General