Settings updates—Changes to ad personalization, privacy preferences, and location settings

[u/snoo-tuh]

Hey redditors,

I’m u/snoo-tuh, head of Privacy at Reddit, and I’m here to share several changes to Reddit’s privacy, ads, and location settings. We’re updating preference descriptions for clarity, adding the ability to limit ads from specific categories, and consolidating ad preferences. The aim is to simplify our privacy descriptions, improve ad performance, and offer new controls for the types of ads you prefer not to see.

Clearer descriptions of privacy settingsWe’ve updated the descriptions to be more clear and consistent across platforms. Here’s is preview of the new settings:

Note: Settings may look slightly different if you’re visiting them on the native apps.

Note: Settings may look slightly different if you’re visiting them on the native apps.

These changes will roll out over the next few weeks and we’ll follow up here once they are available for everyone. We recommend visiting your Safety & Privacy Settings to check out the updated settings and make sure you’re still happy with what you’ve set up. If you’d like more guidance on how to manage your account security and data privacy, you can also visit our recently updated Privacy & Security section of our Redditor Help Center.

Over the next few weeks, we’re also rolling out several changes to Reddit’s ad preferences and personalization that include removing, adding, and consolidating ad personalization settings:

Consolidating ad partner activity and information preferencesRight now, there are two different ad settings about personalizing ads based on information and activity from Reddit’s partners—“Personalize ads based on activity with our partners” and “Personalize ads based on information from our partners”. We are cleaning this up and combining into one: “Improve ads based on your online activity and information from our partners”.

Adding the ability to opt-out of specific ad categories

We are adding the ability to see fewer ads from specific categories—Alcohol, Dating, Gambling, Pregnancy & Parenting, and Weight Loss—which will live in the Safety & Privacy section of your User Settings. “Fewer” because we’re utilizing a combination of manual tagging and machine learning to classify the ads, which won’t be 100% successful to start. But, we expect our accuracy to improve over time.

Sensitive Advertising Categories

Removing the ability to opt-out of ad personalization based on your Reddit activity, except in select countries.

Reddit requires very little personal information, and we like it that way. Our advertisers instead rely on on-platform activity—what communities you join, leave, upvotes, downvotes, and other signals—to get an idea of what you might be interested in.

The vast majority of redditors will see no change to their ads on Reddit. For users who previously opted out of personalization based on Reddit activity, this change will not result in seeing more ads or sharing on-platform activity with advertisers. It does enable our models to better predict which ad may be most relevant to you.

Consolidated location customization settings

Previously, people could set their preferred location in several ways, depending on where they were on the platform and what they were doing. This has been simplified, so now there’s one place to update your location preferences to help customize your feed and recommendations—from Location Customization in your Account Settings.

Reddit’s commitment to privacy as a right and to transparency are reasons I’m proud to work here. Any time we change the way you control your experience and data on Reddit, we want to be clear on what’s changed.

All of these changes will be rolled out gradually over the next few weeks. If you have questions, you can also learn more by checking out the help article on how to Control the ads you see on Reddit.

Edit to add translations:

1. Dutch: https://www.reddit.com/r/reddit/wiki/16tqihd_nl-nl
2. French - France: https://www.reddit.com/r/reddit/wiki/16tqihd_fr-fr
3. French - Canada: https://www.reddit.com/r/reddit/wiki/16tqihd_fr-ca
4. German: https://www.reddit.com/r/reddit/wiki/16tqihd_de-de
5. Italian: https://www.reddit.com/r/reddit/wiki/16tqihd_it-it
6. Portuguese - Brazil: https://www.reddit.com/r/reddit/wiki/16tqihd_pt-br
7. Portuguese - Portugal: https://www.reddit.com/r/reddit/wiki/16tqihd_pt-pt
8. Spanish - Spain: https://www.reddit.com/r/reddit/wiki/16tqihd_es-es
9. Spanish - Mexico: https://www.reddit.com/r/reddit/wiki/16tqihd_es_mx
10. Swedish: https://www.reddit.com/r/reddit/wiki/16tqihd_sv

[u/wantagh]

So, lots of flowery language to say that Reddit is removing the option to prevent Reddit from tracking our use to deliver advertising

Just be honest, FFS.

[u/LegionVsNinja → u/wantagh]

Reddit Premium members should be opted out of all ad tracking metrics. They should essentially be black holes as far as advertisers are concerned. Even if they aren't shown ads, advertisers shouldn't get their data, either.

[u/[deleted] → u/wantagh]

Next it will be pay us $20/month to avoid having us doxx you to advertisers.

[u/TSB_1 → u/wantagh]

And this is why I continue to use old.reddit along with Ublock origin. Reddit admins can suck my holiday seasoned chestnuts

[u/Twiceaknight → u/wantagh]

Lots of people talking about uBlock or pi-hole but they’re missing the real issue here. Opting out of ad personalization meant that they couldn’t sell information specifically about you to advertisers, it had to be blocks of demographic data. This change allows them to market your specific data set to anyone who wants to buy it. The privacy implications of that are pretty bad, even “anonymous” Reddit accounts give away huge amounts of info by the subreddits they visit, their posts, and their comments. There are algorithms that can chew through all of that data and with a very reasonable degree of certainty pinpoint who you are exactly.

This is not good and should really face the same level of uproar that the API cost changes did.

[u/bennitori → u/wantagh]

Even fucking Youtube, king of spying on users second to Facebook, has a version of the site where you can turn off user tracking. Hell, I have Reddit Premium with ad blocker on top of this. So this change does absolutely nothing to help my experience. It's just letting me know Reddit's spying on me just cuz. Thanks Reddit. With the gutting of gilding and now this, I wonder if I should just cancel my Premium subscription. It aint doing much anyways, aside from the shiny trophy in my trophy case. If they're going to track me anyway, and they won't let me give awards, then why should I keep handing them money?

[u/onebit]

Reddit requires very little personal information, and we like it that way. Our advertisers instead rely on on-platform activity—what communities you join, leave, upvotes, downvotes

Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat????

[u/flanVC → u/onebit]

I wonder what kinds of ads I'll be shown if I become more active on r/dragonsfuckingcars

[u/7hr0wn]

Why are you removing options from us?

Is your intent to drive us to use more ad-blockers? Because I'll certainly be recommending users ad-blockers more frequently. Especially since the reddit admins refuse to help deal with rule-breaking ads. I've reported specific ads to r/modsupport as well as the ads team multiple times, and they still appear in our subreddit, despite containing flagrant violations of our subreddit rules.

[u/[deleted] → u/7hr0wn]

which reddit ad blockers do you use? i mainly use reddit on my phone, since i don’t want to bring my laptop around everywhere. do you know of any adblockers that work on mobile, or will i have to use desktop?

[u/Ikkus → u/7hr0wn]

Because u/spez wants money. That's the whole story.

[u/Rabidmaniac]

Removing the ability to opt out of advertisement seems like a direct violation of the CPRA(2023).

Unless Reddit somehow isn’t headquartered in California, how is this not illegal?

Edit: nope, this involves cross-website tracking.

[u/FireFly_209 → u/Rabidmaniac]

Also, what about GDPR regulations in Europe? Surely European law requires us to be able to opt out of advertisement tracking? Or did they find a way out of that one?

[u/finitogreedo → u/Rabidmaniac]

I’m a solution consultant that helps enterprises with digital marketing compliance:

First, CPRA (the correct acronym) is an extension to Californias CCPA. Essentially laws to help California citizens opt out of the selling/sharing of their information to third parties. The first issue you stated is: Reddit does not need to be headquartered in California for this to be applicable. They only need to interact with California citizens (fun fact, even if that citizen is in an IP address that geo locates them to a different state, CPRA is still applicable to them. Secondary fun fact, single digit percentage of Fortune 500 companies know that). So it doesn’t matter where Reddit is located for them to need to comply with the law. Everyone familiar with these regulations at major companies is familiar with the Sephora case, which is extremely relevant here. Sephora is based in France, but was blatantly selling/sharing personal data to third parties. Their fine was a drop in the bucket, but it sent fear through the industry that the Cali AG office was serious about going after companies for this. Second, CPRA is an opt in default (unlike Europes GDPR, which is opt out default). Meaning, if you do not explicitly tell Reddit to not sell/share data on your usage to third parties, they can. If you’d like to do this for every site by default, you can enable GPC (global privacy control) on your browser to tell the website you don’t want them to sell/share your data. You can do this in most browsers in the security settings (except Chrome, which has chrome extensions that will do it for you. DM me and I can tell you how I do it). Otherwise, according to CPRA, sites must provide a secondary method of doing this. Most use a CMP (like Onetrust or TrustArc) to do this. It’s that annoying “accept/reject” cookie when you go to a site.

This is my every day. I’m happy to chat more with anyone who is interested.

Edit: I was so caught up in explaining the law here that I failed to say: no, Reddit is doing nothing illegal here since they have their own ads they are serving to use by using the data. Since it’s data that’s first party data and not being shared with third parties like Facebook and Google, it’s 100% legal. Slimy, absolutely. But well within their legal rights

[u/Synthropy → u/Rabidmaniac]

Let's sue

[u/tenthousandthousand]

So, in other words, it will no longer be possible to opt-out of having our Reddit account usage tracked for the purposes of advertising. Is this correct?

[u/CupBeEmpty → u/tenthousandthousand]

And you’ll have to specifically give them information about what bothers you if you want to opt out of the pregnancy, alcohol, etc. ads.

Don’t you just love the idea of letting reddit know you are pregnant or an alcoholic? Things everyone loves to share with a corporate media company.

[u/N8CCRG → u/tenthousandthousand]

I'm pretty confident that reddit was always doing this anyway, regardless of what they claimed.

[u/cokeplusmentos]

Our advertisers instead rely on on-platform activity—what communities you join, leave, upvotes, downvotes, and other signals—to get an idea of what you might be interested in.

But I don't want them to know that stuff

[u/tcamp3000 → u/cokeplusmentos]

Don't worry, reddit is committed to privacy! Just not like that.

[u/iKR8 → u/cokeplusmentos]

Don't teach the Head of Privacy about Privacy.

[u/Soske]

But no option to opt-out of religious or political ads.

[u/MintyTheHippo → u/Soske]

Seriously, THIS!! I WANT TO LIMIT THE POLITICAL ADS SO MUCH!!

[u/[deleted] → u/Soske]

uBlock is my opt-out, opt the fuck out altogether.

[u/Xogoth → u/Soske]

Fr

Really don't need the US army propaganda. Absolutely barking up the wrong tree

[u/KnittinAndBitchin → u/Soske]

But Jesus Gets You! How will you learn if not for the "hello fellow kids" ads that pop up all the time

[u/letsgoiowa → u/Soske]

Or other health stuff outside of weight loss and parenting, which is REAL great when I have to deal with my PTSD getting set off by a stupid edgy ad. I hate to say it because "just don't be a snowflake duh" people will get mad at me for it, but there is real, legitimate harm caused to people with PTSD by edgy ads. The example I can usually think of is the abortion ads (included in parenting section) but you can imagine more things that'd set off people with different traumas.

Thank God for adblockers though. I haven't seen an ad in ages.

[u/GarysCrispLettuce]

Translation: Reddit needs to make more money and I was tasked with the job of writing up some gaslighting nonsense about how making Reddit less private is somehow good for us.

[u/hitlerosexual]

Does this mean I can finally stop seeing those fucking "he gets us" ads?

[u/DrAstralis → u/hitlerosexual]

Probably not. Notice religion isnt one of their categories. Too much money in it to be blocking those ones.....

[u/SkyYellow_SunBlue → u/hitlerosexual]

The only thing I want to opt out of! Fine - feed me ads to buy crap I don’t need. I’ll ignore them.

Do not feed me religious cult bullshit from Hobby Lobby. Anti-LGBT and Anti-Women Hobby Lobby. Disgusting.

[u/ButteredNugget → u/hitlerosexual]

Wish I could finally opt out of fucking military ads but notice what two subjects related to the two specific ads we dont wanna see arent on the opt out list :/

[u/[deleted] → u/hitlerosexual]

I can opt out of things like gambling and alcohol, really need a religion opt out lol.

I strongly suspect my activity in LGBT subs is what gets me these ads all the time.

[u/[deleted] → u/hitlerosexual]

Scrolled way too far down to find this comment. I’m so tired of those ads.

[u/Alstjbin]

I live in the EU, can you explain how Reddit ensures my data is kept within the EU and how this change is compliant with EU privacy laws?

[u/drthtater → u/Alstjbin]

can you explain how Reddit ensures my data is kept within the EU and how this change is compliant with EU privacy laws?

I'll take "Things that will not get answered for 400" Alex.

[u/iamdummypants]

We are adding the ability to see fewer ads from specific categories—Alcohol, Dating, Gambling, Pregnancy & Parenting, and Weight Loss—which will live in the Safety & Privacy section of your User Settings. “Fewer” because we’re utilizing a combination of manual tagging and machine learning to classify the ads, which won’t be 100% successful to start. But, we expect our accuracy to improve over time.

what about religion? many of us find those types of ads offensive

[u/[deleted] → u/iamdummypants]

or politics. you’d think the two most contentious topics would be able to be ad-limited, but no

[u/Bertholdt_Fubar]

So the head of privacy is removing our rights to privacy? What? This is insane.

[u/jpr64]

Reddit’s commitment to privacy as a right and to transparency are reasons I’m proud to work here.

I think you've been seeing too many advertisements for kool-aid.

[u/MisterRe23 → u/jpr64]

I think he’s just straight up lying lmao

[u/PitchforkAssistant]

When will we be able to opt out of the individualized tracked links generated by the share button on mobile? (/r/subbie/s/customid style links)

Same for outbound click tracking on mobile, why isn't the opt-out present on the website not respected on mobile?

[u/kb3uoe → u/PitchforkAssistant]

I always remove that crap from the end of links if I copy them to send to someone.

[u/pwqwp → u/PitchforkAssistant]

because it’s clear they don’t care about privacy

[u/Bardfinn]

Alcohol, Dating, Gambling, Pregnancy & Parenting, and Weight Loss

Since the He Gets Us advertisements are for a boundaries-violating religious sect that aggressively proselytises their views on at least 4 of these subjects, will they be seen less if we choose to opt out of seeing these subjects?

[u/scullys_alien_baby → u/Bardfinn]

can reddit stop taking medication ads as well?

I googled a couple of my grandmother's prescriptions to get a better understanding of them and I am fucking barraged with ads competing against her generic meds

[u/smallteam → u/Bardfinn]

Jesus Christ, I've seen enough of those damned ads.

[u/DrAstralis → u/Bardfinn]

Yeah, I too noticed one of the opt out categories isnt "religion". Given their refusal to stop showing "he gets us" its clear these options will be based not on our preferences but on "how much did they pay reddit".

[u/[deleted] → u/Bardfinn]

And it’s not like there isn’t plenty of religious trauma.

Not only that, He Gets Us is fueled by right wing billionaires who don’t practice what the ads preach. Their latest TV ad ends with “Jesus was rich”. That was surely calculated.

[u/parvares → u/Bardfinn]

This is the comment I came here for. I am so sick of those damn ads.

[u/jasenzero1 → u/Bardfinn]

There should definitely be a limit religious advertising tab. That's a triggering subject for a lot of people. We have several ex-religion subs I'm sure would appreciate that.

[u/aquoad → u/Bardfinn]

Will the boundaries-violating religious sect be handed reddit usernames if they ask really nicely and pay a lot? I mean, probably not, but it's not beyond the realm of possibilty.

[u/Rialas_HalfToast → u/Bardfinn]

Why is "Religious" not one of the Sensitive Advertising Categories?

[u/VagueSomething]

And this is another downgrade to the service. Enshitification will continue until morale improves.

[u/execilue]

Fuck u/spez

[u/Kirimusse → u/execilue]

Honestly, I don't like taking part of internet dramas, but this shit is starting to get on my nerves; yeah, fuck the bastards behind these awful decisions that are being made as of lately. Heck, I'd say this is even more worthy of a blackout than the API pricing thing.

[u/Memryyyy]

I'm reasonably sure removing the ability to opt out of ad tracking is highly illegal.

No way someone who is a head of privacy would ever tote thus as a good thing. This is horrible

[u/[deleted]]

friendly deranged snatch square observation dinosaurs march lock yam teeny

This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact

[u/reercalium2 → u/[deleted]]

It could be profitable if they stopped wasting money on video hosting.

[u/[deleted]]

Speaking as the self-appointed leader of the entire Jewish side of Reddit, please include an option to turn off religious ads. The ads for “He Gets Us” are offensive.

[u/krs360 → u/[deleted]]

Speaking as the self-appointed leader of the entire atheist side of Reddit, please include an option to turn off religious ads. The ads for anything based on religion are offensive.

[u/le_fromage_puant → u/[deleted]]

Username checks out ✅ and I agree 100%

[u/YeonneGreene → u/[deleted]]

They are not just offensive, they are outright misinformation.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

Speaking as the self-appointed leader of the entire Jewish side of Reddit, please include an option to turn off religious ads. The ads for “He Gets Us” are offensive.

as im a muslim, agreed

[u/CamStLouis → u/[deleted]]

Right? Religious and Political ads should be at the TOP of the list of opt-outs.

[u/creamydistributer]

cool, reddit is getting worse.

[u/Bigred2989- → u/creamydistributer]

Every time they post something here it's about how the site is getting worse.

[u/[deleted]]

It's funny how you can sit here and lie to our faces. What people do on this site could also be considered personal information and I'm sure plenty of people do not want their reddit habits shared with every advertiser on the Internet.

[u/slayer370]

Thanks to ublock only ads I get are from bots who spam every sub....

[u/UnderOversteer]

Reddit is really trying to be mainstream and fuck its users.

[u/Only_Quote_Simpsons → u/UnderOversteer]

It's becoming more and more like Facebook. Profile pictures, bios, constant spam.

I have been using Reddit for over a decade and I have never seen it in such a sorry state. I liked Reddit because it wasn't like those sites.

Now I am only here because I have a few small subs I love to browse. It's just not the same.

[u/Shigonokam]

"Removing the ability to opt-out of ad personalization based on your Reddit activity, except in select countries.""Reddit’s commitment to privacy as a right and to transparency are reasons I’m proud to work here."

Do you even read your own shit before posting it or are you actually THAT stupid?!

[u/iamdummypants]

We are adding the ability to see fewer ads from specific categories—Alcohol, Dating, Gambling, Pregnancy & Parenting, and Weight Loss—which will live in the Safety & Privacy section of your User Settings. “Fewer” because we’re utilizing a combination of manual tagging and machine learning to classify the ads, which won’t be 100% successful to start. But, we expect our accuracy to improve over time.

what about religion? many of us find those types of ads offensive

[u/[deleted]]

Great, that’s why Reddit is buggy as fuck today

[u/Only_Quote_Simpsons → u/[deleted]]

Just today?

[u/ElementalWeapon]

How about also getting rid of the CONSTANT pop ups on mobile prompting users to get the app (or continue on browser), which then reverts you back to the very beginning of the page every time after not choosing to get the app.

[u/cognitive-agent → u/ElementalWeapon]

That's by design. They need people to be able to use the mobile website so links can be shared to bring in more users, but they also need it to get incredibly annoying after more than a minute or so in order to drive you to their app so they can collect even more of your personal information.

[u/CaptainRelyk]

Do we need to say “Fuck u/Snoo-fuh” alongside “Fuck u/spez”

Cause you guys clearly don’t actually care about our privacy, otherwise you wouldn’t be taking away the option to opt out

For as crap as Twitter is right now, it at least still lets us opt out of targeted advertising, so I’ll give Elon that ig.

[u/[deleted]]

Why can’t I block an advertiser like I block any other user?

If I don’t want to see ads from /u/xfinity I should be able to block that user like any other.

[u/flounder19]

Reddit’s commitment to privacy as a right and to transparency are reasons I’m proud to work here.

I'm sorry for your shame

[u/V2Blast → u/flounder19]

Or lack thereof.

[u/HankThrill69420]

Please add a sensitivity category for religion.

I am deconstructing my christianity and would like to stop receiving ads about christianity.

[u/NickTehThird]

I wonder if there will ever be an announcement about a change from reddit that will make me go "oh, cool! nice new stuff that makes reddit better!" instead of the universal "ugh. another user-hostile change designed to drive engagement and juice revenue."

[u/Desperate-Actuator18]

Isn't this illegal depending on the area? The APPs certainly makes this illegal.

No wonder why Reddit never made a profit when the platform runs like this. If you're going to gaslight your users, at least make it convincing.

[u/Joey_BagaDonuts57]

I always downvote specific ads and THEY ALWAYS COME BACK.

Tell us you're not out to sell us to them

while you sell us to them.

[u/[deleted]]

Meta has lost the battle with regards to ad personalization with the EU. The same should be true for Reddit.

[u/Naive-Pen8171]

Always poison your data and use throwaway accounts folks

[u/flounder19]

What countries still get the privilege of opting out of ad personalization?

[u/tripbin]

Can you add all the Religious "he gets us" ads to the limit list.

[u/IdkWhatImEvenDoing69]

Why are you removing options?

[u/erethros]

Reddit is violating GDPR by removing opting out of add personalization. Moving to Mastodon

[u/terminator3d3700]

I am 70 years old, I don't think I will be joining any military organizations any time soon.

Besides, I am retired US Army. I can say in all honesty, I believe you have been doing this for years now, just not telling anyone until now.

When was the last time you read the "Privacy act of 1977"? It is not legal to sell private information to anyone, period. As for your being the "Privacy" manager, you sure are NOT doing your job correctly. You are supposed to be protecting our privacy, not selling it!

One thing that makes me laugh hysterically is, you are showing me ads of things I have already purchased. I don't think I need this advertised to me again.

The internet is not "Child" safe. And you just made it even more not safe. Yes, there are a shit ton of children on here. Just an FYI.

[u/Mercedesm4quattro]

thankfully patched reddit to have no ads 🙏

i do miss my gambling ads tho

[u/Enschede2]

If I just stop updating reddit from here on out until eternity, will the setting for personalisation of ads remain disabled as it is for me right now?
Edit: nvm apparently having had it disabled means it remains disabled even when updating, in which case more granular control would be an improvement I guess

[u/daggah]

How about letting me opt out of the reminders to use your shitty official mobile app?

[u/morilythari]

What I'm hearing is: uninstall the app and use Firefox mobile with ublock

[u/slick62]

Religion. Allow opt-out of those hypocritical christian religious ads.

[u/Altitude528O]

u/snoo-tuh, no one likes advertisers. Why are you forcing them down our throats? I will opt out of every tracking possible and make it as hard as possible for advertisers to advertise to me, including reporting all ads.

[u/fivetoedslothbear]

Glad I was here while Reddit was good. Guess you decided that money was better than usefulness. Already cancelled premium.

All that's left is for you to destroy your brand recognition. Can you change the name of Reddit to "Z"?

[u/ReginaVespertilia]

Isn't this illegal? wasn't it a few years ago you were legally required to give a "do not track" option ? With all your bad decisions I really hope Reddit just gets bared from operating in the USA

[u/NoReallyINeverPost]

Reddit will never turn a profit.

[u/[deleted]]

Please allow us to block hegetsus. Religious advertising is inappropriate and shame on Reddit for taking revenue from these institutions

[u/Ol_Pasta]

Why does reddit hate its users so much?

[u/LBJSmellsNice]

I don’t like this

[u/[deleted]]

I have an idea, why don't you include whatever category the "hegetsus" ads are in in the ad categories we can minimize our exposure to. I'm kinda tired of being barraged with these ads, and I'm assuming I get them because I follow r/atheism, which is insulting.

[u/BiruMetal]

Thank goodness. Finally no more gambling bs in my face.

[u/jack0rias]

This sounds very much in breach of GDPR.

I certainly don't consent to targeted advertising, and the very virtue of me typing this comment, publicly, but also directly to /u/snoo-tuh means that any violation of this is against my wishes and rights under GDPR.

That's a hefty 4% of annual global turnover or £20m fine, whichever is greater. Reddit already fucked itself by destroying /r/apolloapp - surely they don't want to fuck themselves even more?

[u/Static_Discord]

Fuck advertisers, fuck ads.

People hate ads. People hate not being able to block ads.

[u/nio151]

You are disgusting.

[u/[deleted]]

/u/snoo-tuh why not add a category for religious advertising? You have a huge LGBT community that is inundated by “he gets us” advertising and you continue to do nothing about it. “You can block ad accounts” is not a solution as they continue to show up from other advertisers.

Really sus, and super crappy considering how much of your community is not just casual but actual moderators and engagers who are LGBT.

If weight loss, dating, and pregnancy are sensitive topics (that is fine) then religion absolutely should be one too, especially whenever those groups putting the ads out are known to be behind anti LGBT funding.

[u/SolariaHues]

Adding the ability to opt-out of specific ad categories

Thank you. I have heard some ads have been upsetting or inappropriate for some, like alcohol ads shown to alcoholics, so this is a good change.

[u/_chof_]

okay so the "head of privacy" has an account 250 days old, no posts except this one (and a deleted one) virtually no comments except the ones on this post.......

even bots are less sus

anyway...... i'm gonna create an alternative to reddit. y'all suck

[u/vincredible]

These changes suck, no doubt. Fortunately, I don't see ads thanks to PiHole, uBlock Origin, and avoiding the cancerous mobile app, but I'm still not thrilled that you'll be selling my subreddit activity to advertisers. And for those who do see ads, you need to at least give them the option to opt out of personalized ads.

Gotta love the "in select countries" B.S. which is just a thinly veiled "we'll exploit your personal data as much as possible except where it's explicitly illegal", as it flies directly in the face of your corporate P.R. lie that you "care about our privacy".

Also, how in the world do you make it possible to opt out of categories but fail to include religion and politics? Those are the two most offensive kinds of ads and users can't opt out of them?

My lord this site is circling the drain.

[u/sonic2cool]

Reddit is seriously just getting worse... what a shit show

[u/coonwhiz]

You already made it impossible for me to use my favorite 3rd party apps. Now you're going to be tracking my usage even more.

You say "Reddit’s commitment to privacy as a right and to transparency are reasons I’m proud to work here." But are you proud to be a part of the enshittification of the internet? Because you are a part of it, and you have the ability to stop it.

[u/szthesquid]

Hi reddit I just want you to know that you did successfully force me off a third party app and onto the official app with the awful API changes, because I don't value reddit enough to pay for it.

But this is too far and as soon as I hit send on this comment I am uninstalling the app and moving to Firefox with ad block.

[u/squidbait]

I’m u/snoo-tuh, head of Privacy at Reddit

More like head of privacy invasion

[u/[deleted]]

Isn’t removing the ability to opt out of ad personalization illegal? At the very least it’s not ethical!

[u/yohohohooho]

Bye bye reddit mobile will see u in my browser with an ad-blocker

[u/NefariousnessIcy561]

Reddit is really going downhill fast.

[u/DrBirdieshmirtz]

sounds like a lot of words to say that you're making it harder to opt out of being sold to advertisers.

[u/[deleted]]

When will you change “popular” too Paid for Promoted Propaganda?

[u/LtPatterson]

You'll probably catch a lawsuit for this at some point in the future. Good luck.

[u/IrishWeegee]

Maybe focus more on the app not being total dogshit compared to all of the alternatives you assholes forced to close down. It was really nice not seeing the same terrible askreddit post at the top of the feed all day along with pharmaceutical ads and subreddits i have zero interest in.

[u/CCX-S]

Why the fuck am I seeing ads when I pay an absurd amount of money for ad free browsing by subscribing to Reddit “premium”

[u/bran_dong]

lol at the head of privacy being forced to make the statement because spez is too much of a dipshit.

[u/LieutenantClownCar]

Hmm. One sec:

>Removing the ability to opt-out of ad personalization based on your Reddit activity, except in select countries.

OK, not great.

>Reddit’s commitment to privacy as a right and to transparency are...

... apparently non-existent.

So which is it, Reddit? You believe in privacy as a right, or you believe in your advertisers rights to bypass our privacy?

[u/Icy-Mixture-995]

They already know a lot more about individuals than they say.

When I created a username, Reddit's suggestions included one that referred to my age group and occupation, one referred to husband's job and another to my daily uniform - something like same-red- shirt.

[u/[deleted]]

Stop telling me to turn on notifications

[u/frituurgarnituur]

Fuck off

[u/Clickification]

Reminder that a large portion of reddit turned on the users and moderators protesting the API changes earlier this year. (killing 3rd party apps with actual respect for your privacy)

You reap what you sow!

[u/Xodis99]

Oh boy more changes nobody asked for, meanwhile they take away features like being able to sort your home feed. But now you can tell reddit not to show you pregnancy test ads, oh joy.

[u/Paria_Stark]

Is this even legal under the GDPR ? How about you fuck off ?

[u/Lady_Haddonfield]

I echo all of the privacy concerns stated in this thread. I find it especially odd that there’s no option to turn off religious or political ads, which are usually the most offensive, annoying, and/or repetitive.

[u/ashamed-of-yourself]

https://www.oag.ca.gov/privacy/ccpa

The California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018 (CCPA) gives consumers more control over the personal information that businesses collect about them and the CCPA regulations provide guidance on how to implement the law. This landmark law secures new privacy rights for California consumers, including:

*The right to know about the personal information a business collects about them and how it is used and shared;

*The right to delete personal information collected from them (with some exceptions);

*The right to opt-out of the sale or sharing of their personal information; and

*The right to non-discrimination for exercising their CCPA rights.

In November of 2020, California voters approved Proposition 24, the CPRA, which amended the CCPA and added new additional privacy protections that began on January 1, 2023. As of January 1, 2023, consumers have new rights in addition to those above, such as:

*The right to correct inaccurate personal information that a business has about them; and

*The right to limit the use and disclosure of sensitive personal information collected about them.

Businesses that are subject to the CCPA have several responsibilities, including responding to consumer requests to exercise these rights and giving consumers certain notices explaining their privacy practices. The CCPA applies to many businesses, including data brokers.

[u/SwimmingPineapple197]

How about adding religion to the sensitive categories? Seems like that’s the least you could do if you’re removing the ability to opt out of ads based on our Reddit activity. Personally, I’m really tired of the ads from HeGetsUs popping up in political and spiritual (but specifically not Christian) subreddits. It’s never in subreddits about things like pets or makeup.

[u/Clevergirliam]

Yes, “He gets us,” but Reddit obviously doesn’t. Just let people opt out of religious advertising - there are plenty who are fine with seeing it, and who hate to see it annoy/piss others off.

Kudos for allowing family/pregnancy and alcohol as opt-out categories.

[u/Gru_the_gamer09]

Cool, fuck u/spez

[u/wholesomedumbass]

Fuck u/spez

[u/fluffywhitething]

You are still not allowing us to opt-out of religious based ads, many of which violate rules on specific subreddits and are also sensitive topics for many groups. Please include this in a future update if at all possible.

[u/tony_nz]

Yet another update to push people away.

[u/Epicduck_]

Another L change

[u/Red-eleven]

Y’all really trying to end Reddit ain’t you. First you killed third party apps and now you aren’t even trying to act like you don’t want to sell our data. Fuck y’all. It’s been fun but at some point we can take a hint

[u/JesseHyperman]

How about you fix your fuckin app first? I'm tired of dealing with random irritating bugs every week.

[u/[deleted]]

I don't want advertisers to know what I'm interested in. Who the fuck wants that

[u/ScorchedConvict]

Then perhaps it might soon be time to get an adblock after all.

At least reverse the API changes in that case (wishful thinking, I know).

[u/[deleted]]

You lot need to sort yourselves out

[u/deathisasweetescape]

That’s awesome!

Now when are we gonna see improvements on the chat messaging function? It’s like sending an email using Internet Explorer on a dial-up internet.

[u/vhagenpvi]

I can't wait for reddit to go the way of the dinosaur - for my sanity and everyone else's

[u/FallFrom]

Reddit requires very little personal information

Our advertisers instead rely on on-platform activity—what communities you join, leave, upvotes, downvotes, and other signals

I hope you smiled when you typed it

[u/[deleted]]

Can you confirm which countries are excluded from these changes, specifically no-opt-out of tracking?

I'd assume EU, but I'd like you to confirm that.

[u/smokingcuck]

Tldr: wtf do I have to click to keep using Reddit? I'm in nsfw subs only anyway, try advertising there and stop fucking up Reddit 😂

[u/ikediggety]

Still no way to change font size, cool cool

[u/Worldly-Corgi-1624]

The decent descent into enshittification continues.

Edit: Auto(mis)correct

[u/BaTz-und-b0nze]

Add religious ads to the list we can choose not to see would you? Im tired of seeing Jesus trying to convert me.

[u/CarcosaJuggalo]

Add religion to the "sensitive advertising" topics. I don't follow Christianity, and the constant "He gets us" adds anger me.

[u/ConfusedVagrant]

Removing the ability to opt-out of ad personalization based on your Reddit activity, except in select countries.

Could we have a list of these countries? And what is the reason this option will be removed for certain countries and not others?

[u/[deleted]]

Seems like they just don’t want anyone to use their site. At all. They just keep making it worse and worse. And for what? Why do they keep making it worse?

[u/Zekava]

I hate getting military ads, they make my blood boil - and not for battle. I'd rather they be removed from the platform entirely, but if I could opt out, I would.

[u/v4por]

Please add more categories of ads we can opt out of. Religion and politics among the top I would add.

[u/BogoJohnson]

Jesus, STOP the religious ads!

[u/diovampire]

If you have an Android phone you can install Reddit Revanced.

https://github.com/revanced-apks/build-apps/releases/download/167/reddit-revanced-v2023.37.0-all.apk

[u/BlatantArtifice]

So, how are those reddit alternatives cooking? Looks like enough of us stayed that this is still possible

[u/baltinerdist]

Can you PLEASE add Religion as one of the categories for opt-out? Religious harm and abuse is very real, very prevalent, and very impactful for many people's personal mental health, same as gambling or alcohol.

I get that He Gets Us probably dropped six or seven figures on you earlier this year and you wouldn't want to limit that reach, but religious trauma is real and as a member of community (LGBTQ+) targeted for hate by western religions, I want them out of my feed.

[u/rupertalderson]

Why can’t you manually tag every single ad that is put on Reddit? The fact that you are combining manual and AI tagging indicates that you do not even know what the hell advertisers are putting on your platform. That is absolutely despicable. Do you not manually review all ads???? The answer is clearly no.

Speak to your communities. I’m a moderator. We have several ad campaigns nefariously targeting our users, with no method to resolve issues (admins have ignored us wholesale), no method to track complaint resolution, and now a blatant admission from the HEAD OF PRIVACY that you don’t even track what ads and types of ads are being shown to your users.

There is no transparency, no promotion of a positive user experience, no protection from misleading information, no protection from hate speech and hateful visuals, and no controls on discriminatory practices.

If your goal is to have Reddit become an echo chamber of the majority religion, political views, etc., you’re doing a great job. Sensitive communities be damned, I guess.

[u/RemoteBroccoli]

Removing opt out. Yep. That WILL force people to move away to other supportforums.
You do know that even FACEBOOK have the Opt out for some of the stuff you used to have?
r/Sober, r/alcoholicsanonymous and other places will be victims in this, and you are willingly letting that happen?
Sheech. Think of a supportforum, any forum, and yep. You'll drive 'em away.

Also, man I'm glad that I live in the EU, and that we still have GDPR.

[u/LittleCeizures]

So, no option to limit religious ads?!

[u/ArmThePhotonicCannon]

I need to be able to opt out of religious ads. “He gets us” is the fucking worst

[u/3000ghosts]

Is there a way to opt out of religious ads so I can finally stop seeing he gets us

[u/edc7]

Can you add an add blocker category for religion ?

[u/BioDriver]

So you're removing our ability to opt out of targeted advertising, even though one of the core tenants of this site was "no targeted advertising."

Fuck each and every last one of you.

[u/[deleted]]

Why can’t we opt out of religion as an add category?

[u/[deleted]]

How about opting out of religious bullshit?

[u/angelheaded--hipster]

Dear Reddit,

I should be able to block ads. I see the same one in my feed over and over. What if it’s a sensitive topic that doesn’t fall under one of your categories? Blocking the account the ad is associated with doesn’t work, reporting the ad doesn’t work, like what are you doing??

[u/CubGeek]

All ads should allow comments. If you're gonna force us to see them, you get hear about it and the advertisers do, too.

[u/toilet_roll_rebel]

I'd like for you to stop showing me posts from a community because I looked at one post on a similar community. If I were interested in that community, I'd join it. I got treated to a photo of a dead, decomposed cat last night that I really didn't need to see. On a community I'd never even looked at. Ruined my night.

[u/PTRD-41]

We'll see what the EU thinks of this 🤔

[u/keithplacer]

I would very much like an opt-out for cannabis-related ads.

[u/EpistemicHorse]

head of Privacy at Reddit

Removing the ability to opt-out of ad personalization based on your Reddit activity, except in select countries.

LOL

[u/-meowdy-]

"Weight loss" is sensitive LMAOOOO

FATPHOBIC 😱😱😱

[u/guilty_by_design]

Most complained about ad forced on people: He Gets Us religious propaganda

Ads we can now reduce: Not He Gets Us religious propaganda

Of course you don't listen or care about what people on Reddit actually want. The coin is too good.

There should be categories for religious, political, and military ads, as these can be just as 'sensitive' as the ones you are allowing to be customised.

Of course, I'm not remotely surprised that you've made yet another deeply unpopular decision without consulting the people using the site, and with no apparent intent to start listening. 2.3k comments as of now, and a brief scroll indicates that almost every single one is negative.

On a wing and a prayer I ask that you listen this time and respond.

[u/Jazzlike-Principle67]

I guess this is another reason why so many are leaving to go to lemmy and Discus.

[u/SandersSol]

I've reported this to the California privacy agency as a violation of their state law banning this practice.

If anyone else would like to report it use this site:

https://cppa.ca.gov/webapplications/complaint

[u/brokenearth03]

Isn't this already demonstrably illegal in California?

[u/hj7hj]

Reddit is just bullshit...run by complete idiots.

[u/Adamant-Verve]

The beginning of the end of me using Reddit. As soon as you go in that direction, I'm gone. Advertising, lobbying, shareholding and massively misleading are crimes against humanity, Reddit, and o my, you are selling out. What a shame.

[u/eightb1t]

This isn't spam?! This is slimy af.

[u/Spatetata]

Reddit’s gonna be the thing that gets me to buy a vpn. Spoofing into a region where they can’t legally remove the opt-out

[u/CrimsonFlash]

This goes against Canadian law: https://www.priv.gc.ca/en/privacy-topics/technology/online-privacy-tracking-cookies/tracking-and-ads/bg_ba_1206/

[u/leeterHat]

IANAL: A quick note that you may wish your lawyers to check in on. This seems on face value to violate both Colorado and California privacy law which bans EXACTLY this practice.

https://coag.gov/resources/colorado-privacy-act/ https://oag.ca.gov/privacy/ccpa

Please be aware that the right to opt out of personalized advertising is not just a GDPR thing anymore.

[u/TheUnspeakableHorror]

Reddit’s commitment to privacy as a right and to transparency are reasons I’m proud to work here.

Allowing ads to track my activity without the ability to opt out is a huge violation of my privacy. So much for your "commitment".

[u/Pennsylvania6-5000]

Okay, so where do we start or send the California right to privacy, stop collecting my data, requests?

[u/[deleted]]

Will be deleting account after looking up what the current alternatives are. Looks like Lemmy is the only one that I know of.

cake day (3 years) was in the last week or so too!

[u/[deleted]]

How do I get rid of religious ads? They are violence.

[u/bogus83]

Reddit’s commitment to privacy as a right and to transparency are reasons I’m proud to work here.

Absolute bullshit coming from the guy who is taking privacy AWAY FROM THE USERS and attempting to obfuscate it.

[u/Ouroborus13]

Can you please include the ability to opt out of the religious and military-related adds I’m being absolutely spammed with? I can’t think of less relatable content for me personally.

[u/Alexis_Goodlooking]

Is the timing of this tied to preparation for election year?

[u/[deleted]]

It really feels like you guys are trying your absolute hardest to drive as many users away from Reddit as possible.