The Amazon Fire TV Stick is a great entertainment device that gives you access to your favorite entertainment content anywhere you go. You can stream your favorite movies, TV shows, music, and even access thousands of apps and games with this portable and affordable device.
If you use an Amazon Fire Stick device, you may be concerned about your privacy and whether everything you’re doing on your device is being tracked. Fortunately, there are a couple of steps you can take to enhance your privacy while using your Fire Stick device.
In this guide, we’ll be going through some of the settings you can tweak to increase your privacy on Fire Stick. We’ll also go over how you can ensure maximum privacy and security by using a VPN service. Let’s get started.
Disable Data Monitoring and Usage Data Collection
In late 2018, Amazon released a significant update that enabled data monitoring by default and also enabled the company to collect device and app usage data and use them for marketing and product improvement purposes.
If that doesn’t sit well with you, you can disable this feature in the settings menu. Select the Settings page on your Fire TV Stick device and open Preferences. Under Preferences, select Privacy Settings. Here, you’ll see the options for “Device Usage Data” and “Collect App Usage Data”. Turn both of these options off.
You’ll also see an option for “Interest-based Ads”. You can also choose to turn this off if you don’t want to see personalized ads based on your interests.
Next, navigate back to the Preferences menu. This time, select Data Monitoring and turn it off on the next page.
If you don’t see any of these settings on your Fire Stick device, check to make sure you’ve got the latest update. You can do this by navigating to the Settings menu. Select Device or My Fire TV. Nex, select About and then click Check for System Update.
Use a VPN Service
If you don’t want your Internet Service Provider monitoring your every move on your streaming device, you should consider using a VPN. A Virtual Private Network encrypts your traffic, enables you to bypass ISP throttling, and unblocks geo-restricted streaming content.
A VPN device is a no-brainer for privacy conscious individuals. There are currently a ton of options available today, but not all VPN services offer great privacy and security features. Thus, you might need to do some research to find a reputable VPN service that will suit your needs.
You can install your VPN service of choice from the Apps section on your Fire Stick device. Navigate to the Utilities category and you’ll find many of the major VPN services listed there. You can install these apps by navigating to the details page and clicking the download button.
You can also install a VPN from an Android APK file. As you may know, your FIre Stick device runs a modified version of the Android operating system. Thus, Android APK files will install just fine on your Fire Stick. However, not every app will work well on a Fire TV Stick .
If you want to install a VPN app with its APK file, navigate to Settings, click Device or My Fire TV, and then select Developer Options. Here, you’ll find the option to “Allow Apps from Unknown Sources”. Enable that option.
Next, navigate to the Search pane and search for the Downloader app. Download and install the app and then, launch it.
Select the URL bar on the main page of the app and insert a link to the web address that hosts the APK file you want to download. Click the Download .apk button. Once it downloads, install the .apk file and set up your VPN app.
Some VPNs don’t provide the APK files of their apps on their website. Thus, you may have to do some hunting around the web to get them from sites like APKPure or APK Mirror.
Once you’ve downloaded and installed the app using an APK file, you should navigate back to the “Allow Apps from Unknown Sources” option and disable it for security reasons.
Conclusion
You can boost your privacy level on Fire Stick by modifying your privacy settings as shown above and, most importantly, by using a reputable VPN service. These steps to increased privacy on your device are very easy and are definitely recommended. So apply these quick, easy steps to enjoy rest of mind while you consume your favorite content on your Fire TV Stick device.
