How to cover your digital tracks and keep your holiday gifts a surprise

Shopping gifts and scheduling delivery during the holiday season is a headache, not to mention preventing your children, spouse and other family members from seeing through your plans.

In the Internet age, this is more difficult than ever, because online shopping will leave countless digital traces. From tracking your web browser every step to delivering couriers that send regular updates to your phone directly, shopping services seem to deliberately leave clues to spoil surprises.

To avoid leaking your plans, you need craftsmanship, skills—and some digital strategies. Follow these five tips to minimize the risk of gifts being discovered before the holidays arrive.

1. Browse in Invisible Mode

When you browse the web, your browser collects information about your activities, which helps advertisers target you, but also makes your life more convenient – ​​for example, if the browser remembers your location , then you don't need to enter it on the mapping or weather website. However, during shopping season, this kind of tracking can ruin surprises, especially if you share a computer with others. One of the easiest and most effective solutions is to start the browser's invisible or anonymous mode when purchasing a gift. Any browsing history or online activity you accumulate during this session will disappear immediately after you close the browser window.

To start an invisible browsing session, open the file and select New invisible window or according to your browser. There are other ways: In Chrome, select the menu button (three vertical points), and then select New Invisible Window ; in Firefox, click the menu button (three horizontal lines), and then select New Private Window ; In Edge, select the menu button (three horizontal points), and then select New InPrivate window ; In Safari, select File , and then select New Private window . If you forget to start the invisible session in advance, you can also cover up your traces by clearing your browsing history afterwards.

While invisibility mode will make your browser believe that you have never been online, don't be too confident - you may still leave clues. For example, a retail website may have sent a confirmation email to an inbox you share with your partner. So browse through this session, but remember to capture it when you receive a notification email.

2. Set alternate delivery address

The delivery of a strangely shaped package may immediately reveal your gift plan. To prevent family members from discovering these gifts, send them to their alternate address. For example, arrange for gifts to be delivered to your office, Amazon locker, or to your friend’s home, and they can keep them safely until everything is ready and you’re ready to take them home secretly.

If you are shopping on Amazon, setting up an alternate delivery address is easy. First, log in to your account. Then, hover your mouse cursor over the Accounts and Lists buttons on the previous page, and select Your Account and select Your Address . Click Add address to enter a new mailing address, such as your office. When you place an order, you will see a Change button on the checkout page, right next to the delivery address. Click this button to select any address associated with your account. If you haven't done this before, you can even add a new address at this stage.

Amazon also maintains an independent pickup point where you can collect packages. When you place an order, find the option to ship it to Amazon lockers. Then, when you are ready to pick up the item, head to the location.

Other retailers also offer similar options for changing addresses and shipping gifts to alternate addresses. Just remember to double check if you have selected the right address before ordering anything.

3. Check delivery confirmation settings

Usually, the company will send orders and delivery confirmations via text or email. While this practice is helpful, it also creates another potential loophole from which family members may see your shopping plan. To ensure that no accidental information may be exposed, check the settings of the shopping app and website you are using.

For example, you do not want the delivery notification email to appear in the inbox you share with your spouse, nor do you want the mobile reminder to appear when your child plays with your phone. To prevent this from happening, disable these reminders or re-route them to an email address and number that you know no one will check.

For example, on Amazon, you need to hover over the account and list title and select your account . On the next screen, select Communication Preferences to change your email address, or select to send goods updates via SMS to change your mobile number or disable reminders altogether. For security reasons, you can't disable email reminders when placing an order, but you can at least make sure they are sent to a private account. Other retail sites and apps should have similar settings that you can adjust to avoid unexpected notifications.

4. Hide your screen activity

Even if you carefully clear your browsing history and arrange for the delivery of items to the alternate address, you can't completely eliminate the possibility of someone breaking in when they show shopping secrets on your computer screen—for example, a full of jewelry or Lego web page. In addition to removing your laptop or tablet screen from the door, you can also use some extra tools to make your screen activity less noticeable.

Use Chrome add-on program to "reduce productivity." It can turn each website into a monotonous, image-free wall of text. This may make it more difficult for you to shop online, but it will also make it harder for any intruder to peek at your screen from your shoulders.

You can also download an extension, such as Chrome's "Hide Tags" or Firefox's "Urgent Button" that quickly minimizes all open tabs with one click. This way, when someone enters the room, you can pretend you are doing something else instead of shopping for Christmas and bring up the relevant tabs again when safe. For "hidden tags", you can even password protect the tabs you just closed, so others can't easily recover them.

Finally, some keyboard shortcut tricks can do wonders. On Windows, press the Windows keys and the down arrow keys to minimize the current window and press Windows M to minimize all open windows . On macOS, you can use Cmd H to minimize the current window and use Cmd Option H M to handle all open windows. Then, all you have to worry about is not letting a guilty expression on your face...

5. Tracking your family

OK, this trick sounds creepy, but listen to our explanation: monitoring someone else’s location should ring some privacy alerts, but as long as you limit this tracking to the closest family, it’s in a year Very useful at any time. When you can see your spouse, kids, or parents on the map, you don’t have to call or text to make sure they get home safe, check when they get home for dinner, or arrange a meeting in a busy shopping mall. Of course, your teenagers may not be excited about you tracking every move they do, but you and your family can decide where to draw the line and turn these tools on or off as needed.

Back to Christmas Gifts: If you know where certain people are, you can avoid surprises them when they buy gifts for you, try wrapping them, or wait for delivery. In other words, the tracking app allows you to double-check whether the kids are actually attending football training before pulling out the wrapping paper and tape.

While you can find many tracking applications and services, we have written a complete guide on how to share your location without compromising security. If you just want a brief look at the recommended apps, continue reading: We love the built-in tracking tools in Google Maps, Apple’s Find My Friends feature, and messaging apps like WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger.

Google Maps (for Android and iOS, free) allows you to share your location with your contacts, whether for a limited time or before you turn off the feature again. To start, click the menu button (three horizontal lines), then click Position Sharing , and then click Add Person.

Apple has a similar service called Find My Friends, but it only works on iPhones. The app is pre-installed on iOS: Load it, and you can click the Add button to start sharing your location with others. Once location sharing is approved, your contacts will appear in the iOS app and the iCloud web portal.

You can also share locations through conversation threads in some instant messaging applications. In WhatsApp, click the paperclip button (on Android) or the plus button (on iOS) and select the position . On Facebook Messenger, click the plus button, and then click the position . Of course, this option may reveal that you are engaging in a secret gift-giving event, but your family won't know exactly what the event is.

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