Browser developer tools are super-handy, allowing you to do all sorts of wonderful things to the sites you visit. All good things, of course. But, through social engineering, these tools can be used for evil. Turns out this was enough of problem for Facebook to stick a very visible warning in the website's source code.

Browser extensions are fantastic but, as superheroes have taught us, with great power comes great responsibility. Malicious developers can hide bad behaviour inside useful extensions and when they slip through the screening process, the only option left to the likes of Mozilla and Google is to ban them. Mozilla has updated its blocked add-on list and it includes an extension the company itself gave the thumbs-up just this week.

Do you have any idea whether you’re “safe” online? Online security and privacy are complicated, and risks vary by person: You might worry about getting harassed, hacked, or your boss finding your terrible old blog posts and using them as an excuse to fire you. Crash Override’s Automated Cybersecurity Helper helps you secure your accounts according to your needs, and it guides you one step at a time so you don’t get overwhelmed.

You may think you’ve turned Google’s location tracking history off, but according to a new Associated Press report released today, you might be wrong.

Chrome: Keeping up on the latest security information is tough and odds are good that you don't think about website hacks very much unless you see a headline that a particular site or service exposed your user name and password.

If you’ve ever experienced that eerie moment where you’ve been chatting about needing a new pair of shoes, then see an ad for a shoe sale in the middle of your social media feed just a few minutes later, you’ve likely wondered just how much our devices are listening in without us realising. Whether or not that’s happened to you, privacy and security are concerns for us all, and it’s important to know what our devices are up to.

Given all the controversy surrounding Facebook and how third parties have been slurping up up our data and using it in ways that fall outside their terms and conditions, it would have seemed prudent to hang back from releasing any new services that might be considered sensitive. But Facebook is pushing forward with testing of its new dating service.

Internet ads are so invasive that we can’t blame you for thinking that Facebook is listening to you talk. It’s probably not, but it is helping ad networks track you across the internet and across your apps. Tech public policy expert Chris Yiu recently tweeted 14 different ways that ads follow you around the internet, even when you’re logged out, in incognito, using a different browser, or on a new device.

How does that Dark Knight Rises quote go again? "You either die a hero, or live long enough to see yourself become the villain"? Turns out, this applies to software as much as it does to superheroes. CCleaner, once the premiere tool against crap-installing programs, is becoming the very thing it was designed to fight.

Amid mounting pressure from privacy activists and a public concerned by how their medical data will be used, Health Minister Greg Hunt has announced a number of changes to be made to the My Health Record rollout, from what happens when you cancel a record to restrictions around who can access the data.

Facebook continues to fight back against application developers that have bypassed whatever controls they had in place before. Starting from now, any apps that have not been resubmitted for review are being cut off and will lose access to data.

At least one driver working for Uber has been livestreaming passengers without their consent, according to a recent story in the St Louis Post-Dispatch. Viewers on Twitch have been rating the female passengers, speculating about incomes, and chatting about the marriages and personal lives of unsuspecting users of the ridesharing service.

Ever since the Facebook/Cambridge Analytica bombshell, online privacy has been on all of our minds. But it isn’t just Facebook that’s tracking you. From other tech giants to most store rewards credit cards, countless companies deploy similar tactics — even your favourite (or hated) forum site, Reddit.

We ask a lot of Facebook. On one hand we want the social media giant to make it easier for us to communicate with our friends and to better engage with our community. We also see it as an entertainment platform and even as a proxy for trashy magazines as we read weird stories and complete some goofy quizzes. But many of us also expect it to be a reliable news source that doesn't spread disinformation. Now that the furore over the Cambridge Analytica scandal has receded, it's time to look at whether things are any better and what Facebook is doing.

A dad named Jack R. says just about every week, his 9-year-old son asks if he can use the app Musical.ly. His son's best friend has been telling him that everyone at school has an account. After hearing the kid beg all summer, Jack finally decided to download it onto his own phone and sign up himself so that he could look into the privacy settings and "see how stranger-danger it was."

When he entered his gender (male) and birthday (he's 32), Jack says he was bombarded with content he never expected.

July 16 marks the start of the three-month period in which Australians can opt-out of the government's My Health Record. Planned as an "online summary of your health information" that "can be accessed at any time by you and your healthcare providers", there are no guarantees about how your data will be used by said providers. Here's what you need to know about MHR and how to opt-out if privacy is your main concern.

Who knows where you ran last week? If you're privacy-minded, perhaps just you... and your running app. But our fitness apps often share more information than we realise. The Strava app, and now Polar Flow, have released maps that gave away potentially sensitive military locations.

Android: Sometimes you want to watch a video on YouTube and not have it show up in your history. For those moments when you need to go undercover, YouTube recently added an Incognito mode that makes it easier to watch videos without leaving a trace.

Opening your phone with your fingerprint or facial recognition is cool and convenient. But it also means people can easily unlock your phone without permission - while in the process of being robbed say, or if you're arrested on suspicion of committing a crime yourself. Thankfully iOS and Android let you temporarily turn off fingerprint or face recognition with several different methods.