PEMBROKE PARK, Fla. – Many people are becoming more focused on their personal privacy after news leaked about the federal government's surveillance program. But everyday technology could actually be spilling your secrets!
According to Local 10 Tech Expert Craig Agranoff, everything from the TV in your living room to the power meter outside your home is actually jeopardizing your privacy, by collecting data about you!
Something that seems harmless, like watching TV, is actually when you're being watched! Agranoff told Local 10's Jason Martinez products like Xbox are often the culprit.
"They know how you move, how you play, how you speak and they're trying to push advertisements to make you interact with those advertisements so that they can see your motions and learn a lot of things about you that you probably don't want to share!"
Think printing papers from home rather than work protects you? Think again! Your printer can track everything about you.
"If you hand a document off to somebody, they can always find out where it came from."
Agranoff's tip: if you print, be prepared to shred!
He also warns that the power meters outside your home know more about you than you ever imagined. They don't call them smart meters for nothing!
"These new smart meters can detect when you sleep, when you're up, when you wash your clothes, when you take a bath!" People who get a hold of the information could use it against you, knowing when you're not home and what's a good time to break in.
The threat to your privacy doesn't stop when you unplug your gadgets. There's even danger in your wallet... in the form of loyalty cards!
"If you are one of those silly people that use your real name, your real birth date, your real address, real phone number, they've got all the information! They're not giving you these because they want you to have loyalty, they're giving you these to collect your data."
While it's unlikely people will go off the grid entirely to protect their privacy, it's a good start to know just how much data is being collected about you from inside your own home!