One of the most important things to focus on in today’s digital world is tech safety, more importantly, protecting your personal information and data.
Though there are lots of safety features that come with most smartphones, they can’t protect you from everything, including apps you download to your phone. Sometimes, apps can collect a lot more of your personal data than you may realize, which risks your privacy and has the potential to put your information in the hands of the wrong people. Using information from tech experts, we’re listing three of the ‘worst’ apps to have on your phone when it comes to protecting your data. Read more about them below.
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1. X (Formerly Twitter)
One of today's most popular social media apps is X, which used to be Twitter before it was purchased by Elon Musk. On X, people share funny memes, news stories, viral videos, and more. Though it can be super entertaining, it's actually an app that puts your data at risk.
"Users go here to stay up to date on current events, follow their favorite talking heads and generally troll their enemies," explains cybersecurity author Patrick Coughlin. "Now, X collects biometric data and uses public user content, including images of your face and your voice, to train its own Grok AI models."
2. Bumble
Dating apps are one of the most common ways for people to find love or fun dates these days. However, not all of them have your safety in mind. More recently, Bumble made some updates to its app, and they happen to be risky ones.
"Most people assume a dating app's biggest privacy risk is someone seeing your profile," explains cybersecurity expert Rashmi Mandayam. "The real risk is far less visible. Bumble has faced documented complaints for sending personal profile data to OpenAI without explicit user consent and has been pressed by Mozilla and a coalition of privacy organizations to clarify whether it sells sensitive user data, including information belonging to domestic violence survivors and LGBTQ+ users whose safety depends on that data staying private. The intimacy of what dating apps know about you makes them uniquely dangerous when privacy practices are unclear."
3. Meta Apps (Facebook, Instagram, etc.)
When it comes to social media, Meta, the company founded by Mark Zuckerberg, owns some of the most popular apps, like Facebook and Instagram. In recent years, more scary information has come out about how Meta uses people's data, and none of it has been all that comforting.
"Users come here to connect with others and be entertained," adds Coughlin. "They didn't come here to line the pockets of fraudsters. Meta's apps collect somewhere north of 150 distinct data points per user and stitch them together across the entire family of products, creating a boon for legitimate and fraudulent advertisers alike. Meta's platforms have become the single largest reported source of consumer fraud in the United States."
