Hi there! I like to listen to the “Slightly something else” podcast. Although it is gaming-related, they have these ad-segments that have some kind of targetting, as it is always in the language from where I’ve downloaded the episone.
Yesterday I was really surprised that the ad seemed very well targeted, because it has been referencing a very specific topic concerning my flatmates and me that doesn’t have anything to do with gaming.
My first theory was that my IP was correlated with search terms my partner googled in my home IP (I search with searxng). But then I realized that I’ve subscribed to another podcast related to the advertised topic. (also: the episode with the advertisements was downloaded via mobile network)
So… Apparently, spotify (where slightly something else is hosted via anchor.fm) analyzes the podcasts I subscribe to via rss feed. Is there any way how I can avoid being profiled? Is this the reason why I’d start using a commercial VPN?
Edit: I’d like to reply to your comments, but my lemmy instance won’t display them correctly. So I’ll try to answer here: I’m already using Antennapod with rss feeds for download. That’s why I was so suprised and pissed that the ad was so obviously targeted.
You can use yt-dlp to download entire channels. I’ve noticed that this can sometimes cut out the ad entirely. Other times I will get a targeted ad.
Anchor.fm is part of Spotify and most of the time you will receive some sort of targeted ad no matter if the app is open source or not.
What you are describing may be an instance of Cross-Device Ad Targeting.