PexelsThere’s a new online quiz doing the rounds that claims it knows all about you based on what apps you have on your phone.
The quiz – from The Washington Post – reckons it can determine your gender, age and how much money you make based purely on how you use your smartphone.
PixabayIt uses 32 ‘yes or no’ questions and then bases its calculations on generalisations like ‘old people love iHeartRadio’ and ‘single people use SoundCloud for music’.
To be honest I had my doubts about its abilities and so obviously had to give it a go.
I was fairly certain there would be no way it could guess my demographics correctly and it turns out I was right.
I can confirm that I am neither single, nor am I a lady. I am younger than 32 (but only by a month) and unfortunately I do not earn more than $52,000 (£37,000) a year.
To see if it ‘knows’ you any better than it does me you can take the quiz here.
Although the results of the quiz were about as off as they could be for me, it is actually quite easy for internet researchers to build up a spookily accurate profile of you.
When you add in other sorts of personal data that many apps collect – location, contacts and phone usage – it’s easy to see how targeted ads and other personalised features can be creepily accurate.
