Turn Off Tracking
To help prevent Microsoft from gathering random information, especially about your location or location history, head over to your privacy settings.
Hit Start, and then click on Setting and Privacy from there. From the Privacy menu you can choose exactly how your computer uses the information it collects from you. One last thing you’ll want to do while still in the Privacy settings is to click Feedback & Diagnostics and change the Feedback Frequency to “never” and the Diagnostic and Usage Data to “basic”.
Doing these things helps prevent Microsoft from collecting loads of random data on you.
Safeguard Your Internet History and Habits
If you happen to be using the new Microsoft Edge Internet browser, know that it sends your complete browsing history to Microsoft so it can “help Cortana personalize your experience.”
Turning this off is a cinch by clicking on the ellipsis button in the top right corner of Edge, then go to Setting > Advanced Settings > View Advanced Setting, and under Privacy and Services turn off “Have Cortana Assist Me in Microsoft Edge.”
Another thing you should turn off is the “use page prediction to speed up browsing, improve reading, and make my overall experience better” option.
Tread Carefully With Cortana
Admittedly, Cortana is a pretty cool feature of Windows 10. Unfortunately Cortana is very nosey and will snoop through anything on your computer and your browsing history. But hey, it’s all in an attempt to “get to know you better”.
The worst part about what Cortana does is how it saves all of this information about you, including audio and video files, phone calls, and literally everything. It’s all stored in the Cloud.
If this is something that seriously creeps you out you’re able to adjust your setting by logging into your Bing account. All you’ll need to do is clear the “interests” data that Cortana and Bing have ‘learned’ about you, and also clear the Cortana data that includes “Speech, Inking and Typing”.
