Amazon’s New About You Page Lists Everything the Company Knows About You.
It’s no surprise that Amazon collects data about you based on your purchases. And now you can directly see the conclusions the company has drawn from all this activity.
Amazon’s About You page, currently in beta after launching in May of this year, uses customer activity data to create detailed profiles of you in categories like Product Preferences, Interests & Hobbies, and Home & Family. Amazon uses this data to personalize your shopping experience. Here’s how to navigate the About You page and personalize it in your Amazon account .
What Amazon Thinks It Knows About You
The results can be surprisingly concrete. My editor-in-chief, Jordan Calhoun , shared his page, which contains the following posts:
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“There are probably two adults in it.”
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Owns a PlayStation 5 console
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“Prioritizes plant-based meat alternatives over traditional options”
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“I’m constantly subscribed to several streaming services.”
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Owns a large dog
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“He probably has a cat.”
Let me be clear: I try to never personally use Amazon. I use it almost exclusively to find great deals for you, my dear readers. However, here’s what Amazon thinks they know about me: “Values durable travel goods,” “prefers athletic and casual wear,” “regularly practices yoga,” and “frequently listens to music.”
What is considered data
In its privacy notice, Amazon lists all actions that result in the transfer of user data to the company. This includes obvious things like searching for products and placing orders. It also includes actions you might not be aware of, such as interacting with the Alexa voice service, participating in discussion forums, or linking your Amazon account to a third-party company.
How to view your About page
On the computer:
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Hover over the “Hello [your name]” text in the upper right corner of the Amazon page.
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In the “Your Account” section, click “Account”.
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In the Order and Shopping Settings section, click Your Shopping Settings.
Here you can add your own information, such as shoe size, interests, and dietary preferences. Scroll down the page and you’ll see a blue hyperlink labeled “Manage Your Information.” Click it, and you’ll see what compromising information Amazon stores about you.
In the mobile app:
Click the menu icon (three horizontal lines) in the bottom menu bar, then go to Account > Purchase Settings > About.
You can edit this, but you can’t undo it.
Shoppers can’t directly opt out of the “About You” feature. However, they can customize their data by adding the information they want to share with Amazon and removing assumptions they consider inaccurate or too personal.
Import data from other AI chatbots.
On the “About You” page, customers also have the option to “make Amazon even more personal” by importing personal data they’ve shared with other AI agents. Amazon prompts you to enter data into a chatbot to create a shopping profile, then asks you to copy the bot’s response and paste it back into Amazon.
Whether this is worthwhile is entirely up to you. Considering how much information Amazon already collects from your online activity and purchases, transferring your profile from another AI service is a decision worth carefully considering. In any case, taking a few minutes to review your profile and remove inaccurate or overly personal information will allow you to easily learn and change what Amazon knows about you.