How to Protect Your Privacy in Windows 10 – Follow These 5 Steps

If you are familiar with search engine service providers such as Google, DuckDuckGo, or Bing, you’ll agree with me that “how to protect your privacy“, or “how do I protect my privacy“, or “how to stay secured online” are top search phrases that comes higher amongst the list of things people search for on a daily basis.

Privacy is one of the most debatable topics nowadays. Everyone wish to have their privacy intact and for this, they are ready to spend any amount of money. However, spending the money on unnecessary instruments is not a full proof solution to keep your privacy protected. But if we remain a bit alert and follow some common tweaks then we can ourselves protect our privacy. Now when it comes to the Windows 10, Microsoft is criticized for some of its features that don’t seem to be in accordance with the privacy rules and policies that one needs to follow. But guys do believe that it’s not that much difficult to protect your privacy in Windows 10. In this article, we will discuss how following some simple tips will protect your privacy in Windows 10.

Expert’s Guide on How to Protect Your Privacy in Windows 10

Turn Off Location Access

This is one of the most basic features that we never turn off, and in turn, we let our current location known to others. This means if you have turned on your location service then Windows, services and other apps can use your location by sending location-specific offers or ads to you. If you are ordering some food from the nearby restaurant then turning on the location access is ok but turning on your location access all the time doesn’t make any sense. Therefore, we advise you to disable your location access by following the steps below:

1. 1. •    Click on Windows Start button and select Settings (gear icon) > Privacy > Location.
      •    Now click on Change button to toggle off location service for the device.
      •    That’s it now your location service is disabled

Moreover, you can also give your location access to some of the apps, instead of allowing it for every app.

Stop Notification to Show on Lock Screen:

It is a common practice followed by every user to lock his screen while moving away from it. But if you have let the notifications to pop up even on the lock screen then it’s a serious concern to your privacy. Therefore, it is highly recommended to turn off your notification while your computer is locked. To turn off notifications appearing on lock screen follow the below steps:

1. 1. •    Click on Windows Start button and select Settings (gear icon) > System > Notifications & actions.
      •    Now toggle off the option, Show notifications on the lock screen.
      •    This will stop all the notifications from appearing on the lock screen.

If you are more concerned about your privacy, then you can also disable other types of notifications as well.

Never Make your Account Information Public:

Keeping your account info private is another method to not only protect your id but also privacy in Windows 10. This is because if you allow apps to access your account information then they can view your name, picture, and other account details. But once denied none of the apps can view your account information keeping your privacy intact. To do so all you need is to follow the steps below:

1. 1. •    Click on Windows Start button and select Settings (gear icon) > Privacy > Account Info.
      •    Now click on Change to turn off the account info access.
      •    Also, toggle off the option that allows an app to access your account info.

Manage your Privacy using Privacy Dashboard of Microsoft:

Microsoft Privacy Dashboard is a less known tool that helps you to manage your privacy. By logging into this dashboard, you can not only view but also delete the data at once, that is gathered by Microsoft. To get started all you need to do is to visit the following link https://account.microsoft.com/privacy/ and sign in with your Microsoft account. Once signed in you can view and delete all your browsing history collected while using Microsoft Edge and Cortana, clear your search history, clear all your location information, manage apps and services that access your data and much more. And still, if you have some other privacy questions and concerns then you can also contact Microsoft privacy team.

Turn Off Timeline to Protect Your Privacy:

While for many users Windows Timeline feature is one of the most loved features, on the other side it is a matter of concern for others. This smart feature helps you to resume your activities from where you have left not only on the current PC but also from all the PC where you have signed in. Now, in order to make that possible Windows do gather information about your activities from all the PC, you are signed in. So, if you too feel this as a privacy threat then you can easily turn this off. To do so, please follow the below steps:

1. 1. •    Click on Windows Start button and select Settings (gear icon) > Privacy > Activity history.
      •    Now uncheck the option, Store my activity history on this device.
      •    Also, uncheck the option, Send my activity history to Microsoft.

Now Windows 10 will not gather information about your activities.

So, readers, now you can yourself realize that protecting your privacy in Windows 10 is not an uphill task. You have to follow just the above-discussed tweaks and keep your privacy intact.

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Olawale Daniel

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Olawale Daniel is a seasoned blockchain technology consultant and digital media entrepreneur with years of experience in digital marketing, real estate, and tech publishing. He has had the chance of working with multinational firms in the field of marketing, branding, publishing and leadership. He loves tech support services!

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