I saw an advertisement on t.v. for Hydro Mousse. I went to their web site: hydromousse.com. I did not Google it, I typed the URL in the search bar. I browsed the web site then exited without clicking anything on it. A few minutes later I received an email from <removed> advertising Hydro Mousse. Is someone spying on my web activity? And how did they get my email address? How can I prevent this in the future?
Scary, unethical, mind blowing! No, it is not a coincidence!!! Thanks for the link.
Is there a way to view cookies in Norton (or any other security software), along with their associated websites, then remove the ones you don't want and keep the ones you do?
gwalks:Still not getting it.
The following article more fully explains how this works:
https://askleo.com/how-did-a-website-discover-my-email-address/
Did you happen to have your e-mail up and then type in the address bar to go to the hydro mousse Website? I've seen in the Terms of Service (TOS) for certain Websites that in addition to monitoring where you specifically click on their site, they can tell what Website you came from. With monitoring technologies becoming ever-sophisticated these days, please see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_beacon nothing really surprises these days. I will say this, if you just visited their site and did not go under say 'sign me up for your newsletter' and you were still contacted by them, that seems predatory, and i would probably not have any dealings with them. I mean, i'm a person who will even go to international sites, yet, i do not mysteriously get an e-mail from them without me consenting to such first.
What i used to do was locate the folder with the cookies and open the files utilizing Notepad. There were instances where i noticed my full e-mail address would be presented in the strings of data. Suffice it to say, those files i would either delete or conveniently edit the strings so that my e-mail was removed, as i was not sure (at the time) if a given Website might have some sort of "reader" to ascertain that information. However, what i am now noticing in Windows 10, (in the supposed folder where cookie information is: (INetCache) when you open the files utilizing Notepad you are now hit with, "Cookies are no longer stored in files..." Perhaps this is a security augmentation? I came across a lengthy discussion about the nature of cookies now:
Sincerely,
H.B.
Still not getting it. Suppose the site in question has a relationship with a data mining site (or affiliate) which has my email address. What information does the site use from my visit to that site which it then gives to the data mining site (or affiliate) in order to look up my email address?
gwalks:How can they get my email address just from a website visit? They can get an email address from a tracking cookie?
They can't. Someplace where you have registered with your email address is likely involved. That site probably has an affiliation with the advertising company associated with Hydro Mousse.
I've had that happen also on Facebook, but never had my email address lifted like that before. How can they get my email address just from a website visit? They can get an email address from a tracking cookie? And, does every visit to a website result in getting another tracking cookie? Or does it come from reading my IP address and then associating that with an email address (how?)??
Tracking cookies. Hydro Mousse may not have had your email address, but they no doubt have an affiliation with someone who does. It's like Facebook: I can't tell you how many times I have visited websites searching for a product, only to have that product's ad immediately show up on my Facebook newsfeed.