There is no quick fix for online privacy protection.  Unfortunately the internet is not an opt-in universe where the user has the power to check a box of whether or not to allow data tracking companies to track her clicks across the web.

What you’ll realize in reading this article that what most people don’t realize is that a visit to one article on a site like CNN actually allows dozens of companies to track your web browsing activities from that moment on.  Yes, they are doing much more than tracking you on that one website which didn’t tell you that these companies have deals with them to suck your information.

Another little known fact is that the goldmine for these companies is that they can track you because you are a friend of someone else.  For instance, if you are my Facebook friend and a data retrieval company is tracking me, they will be able to reach your information because we are connected.  This is truly the dark side of online connectivity.

Every day we go online, read news, share on social media sites, listen to music, research everything from how to cook a recipe to how the latest health fad can slim our waistlines. Each click of the mouse as we do these things leaves breadcrumb trails of our interests, needs and websites we stumble upon.

We all know that, right? But do you know about Flash cookies that leave an unlimited number of cookies on your computer? These cookies track your web browsing activity for hundreds of companies you don’t even know exist. They may have access to the information you leave about your finances, health, relationships, interests, birthdays, preferences, address, occupation, age and more. This information affects which online advertising you are served up, which credit card offers you are presented with, while also creating a profile of you with both correct and incorrect assumptions based on these connections.

I learned about Flash cookies, or Flash Local Shared Objects (LSOs), while watching a Ted Talk video of Gary Kovacs, the CEO of Mozilla, describe the new free Collusion Firefox add-on. Kovacs’ talk on Tracking the Trackers is a wakeup call to how much privacy we have unknowingly given away as the price of using the internet.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Behavioral tracking, when done with our permission, can help companies we like to connect us to deals, offers, products and services that make our lives better. But the reality today is that the majority of the companies that track us online and collect data on our activities never asked for permission and we never would give them permission if they did ask. As an industry described by Kovacs as being worth over $39 billion, it is safe to assume they will fight regulation and giving consumers the power to choose which companies they allow to track their online information.

Rules and regulations for consumer protection against the darker side of behavioral targeting have not been created. If Lori Anderson, the author of I Know Who You Are and I Know What You Did, has her way, we will eventually create a social networking constitution that may be the first positive step in rectifying this situation.

To protect yourself and your family today you can add Collusion, Better Privacy and No Script to your Firefox browser. If you are a Chrome browser user you can add Keep My Opt-Outs and Do Not Track PlusChrome browser extensions and follow these steps to manually remove Flash cookies from your computer.

This article was originally published in The Huffington Post

If you are still worried about your information being on the web, get over it.  Google your phone number and you’ll see your name and address with a link to Google Maps.

That information has been online for at least a couple of years.  Has it hurt you? I doubt it.  You’d be better served to set up a Google profile so that people will read information about you that you would like them to see.

Currently 74.2% of the American population is online.  That leaves about 80 million people who are still not using the interwebs, but their information is most likely on the interwebs even though they’re late adopters.

The opportunities of being ubiquitous online are so far beyond the risks that it’s hard not to laugh when people express fear of baddies on the internets.  Do they exist? Yes.  Just like you’ll find a sex offender in your neighborhood if you search for them.  Have they shown up at your door lately? Probably not.

Yes they’re a threat, but the perceived threat is huge compared to the actual chance of a real threat.  Trying to be invisible online is about as effective as moving to a remote cave to be protected from a sex offender since they’re in every metropolitan neighborhood.  Studies since 2005 have repeatedly shown that identity theft, the largest privacy concern for most people, happens less often, is less harmful and is less costly online rather than offline.

Evidence continually points to the fact that being online, being able to be found and building your personal brand are incredibly beneficial and those who are ignoring this are doing so at their own peril.  The web is evolving into being the social web and those who embrace connecting to Influencers and becoming Influencers will be the ones to enjoy the most personal and professional benefits from this shift.

As Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook’s founder, recently said at the Crunchies conference, “Public is the new social norm.”