[WhackyIdeas]

Maybe the data is sold from some of the apps on our smartphones. Also, pretty sure most of the payment providers folk e-shops use on their checkouts sell the data to Google (and I am dead certain Google were bragging about knowing about almost any transaction which happens on the on the web). That is a part in the chain which not even most online shops would even be aware of.

[cornflake23]

Yup, I often speculate that for me, perhaps for many others, apps (and the Android/iOS platforms) are the source.

I’ve been slowly switching to web/desktop based alternatives- those too have their issues (eg correlating all the traffic out of my single home NAT’d IP address.

Mulling deleting apps off my phone as well, but many non-app “mobile” experiences are completely unusable.