Opt out of “targeted” advertising on your iPhone/iPad

Have you noticed some of the ads on your iPhone are for things you are marginally interested in? That’s because the iPhone iAd system is passively targeting your “Demographic(s), Application preferences, Music passions, Movie, TV and audiobook genre interests, Location, Device (iPhone, iPod touch) and Network (WiFi, 3G)”

So Apple sees me when I’m reading? They know when I’m awake? They know… waitaminute, that’s Santa’s gig!

Fortunately, there is a way to opt out of targeted advertising on the iPhone.

While you are on your iPhone, go to…

http://oo.apple.com

Once you visit that site, the message “You have successfully opted out” will appear and you will be automatically opted out of interest-based ads”.

You will have to do this on every device you have, though. (It’s not account based, but hardware based.)

You will still see ads on the apps that push them, but they will only be “generic” ads and not anything based on what they know about you.