You have probably all experienced it in one way or another, but on the Internet, you are tracked in all directions… and this is particularly the case with advertising. Advertising agencies, in trying to make their advertising spaces more attractive to advertisers, have set up systems to target advertising and adapt it to your tastes.
The purpose of this article is not to judge this controversial process, but rather to find out how you can prevent this advertising tracking on the web.
How do they do it? It's very simple.
These ads are based on your interests. And your interests are determined by the websites you have visited before…
Some people appreciate finding ads that are tailored to their tastes, but others can't stand this systematic tracking that encroaches on their privacy.
Not to mention the compromising situations that this can cause if you are in the habit of surfing on more or less dubious websites!
So if you want companies to stop using your past browsing data to show you targeted ads, just tell them ! The biggest players on the web like Microsoft, Google, Yahoo, Amazon or Facebook, among others, offer simple solutions to stop these targeted advertisements.
Please note that in some cases, the manipulation will have to be done on each of the web browsers you use. And this will not prevent you from having advertising on the web… it will just no longer be targeted to your interests.
Visit adssettings.google.com, scroll down the page a bit and make sure that the setting “ Ads personalization is enabled » is disabled. Alternatively, you can manage your interests directly. The manipulation will be taken into account for all devices or browsers on which you are logged in to your Google account.
Microsoft
Visit choice.microsoft.com/fr-fr/opt-out and disable the button “ Personalized ads in this browser"
On your Windows computer, you can also disable your “advertising ID.” On Windows 10, simply go to Settings > Privacy > General and disable the “ Let apps use my advertising ID". The same option should exist for Windows 8 computers.
Amazon
Just like Google, Amazon serves interest-based ads on its site, but also on external sites. Visit amazon.fr/gp/dra/info and choose the option " Do not personalize ads served by Amazon for this browser Internett ». This option is linked to the famous browser cookies and is not linked to your Amazon account. So if you delete the cookies from your browser, your choice will be reset.
Yahoo
On Yahoo too, the manipulation is done in one click by going to aim.yahoo.com/aim/ie/fr/optout/ and clicking on the blue “Disabled” button. Note that the manipulation will also be based on cookies unless you are logged into your Yahoo account.
Go to Twitter settings, in the section titled Security and Confidentiality. Scroll down almost to the bottom of the page and uncheck “Adjust ads based on partner information.”
On the Twitter app, the process is pretty much similar: go to "Me", click on the little gear meaning "Settings", choose your account then uncheck "Adjust ads based on partner information".
See you in Settings > Ads, click “Edit” next to “Ads based on my use of websites and apps”. Under “Choose setting” select “No”. You can also play around with the other 2 options.
iOS (Apple)
On your iPhone, iPad, iPod, go to Settings > Privacy > Advertising and turn off “Limit Ad Tracking” to disable tracking by iAd (Apple’s advertising network).
Android
On your smartphone, go to Settings > Accounts & sync > Google > Ads then click on “Opt out of interest-based ads” and finally one last click on “Reset advertising identifier”. This will only remove Google’s targeted advertising from your phone.
Stop all targeted ads on a browser
This solution works with a cookie system and will therefore be completely linked to your Internet browser and the device you are using. The process will therefore have to be repeated on each device and each time you clean cookies.
Indeed, there are online services that allow you to opt out of targeted advertising for most of the major online advertising players. These services rely on the goodwill of advertising agencies and allow you to inform them that you do not wish to receive targeted advertising on the browser you are currently using.
So you can go to AboutAds ou Network Advertising which both offer a similar tool that will allow you to choose all or some of the advertising networks for which you wish to prevent targeted advertising.
If you want to know more about targeted advertising, here is a video in English that explains everything!
Article updated on May 7, 2025 by Byothe
