Privacy has always been an important value to Americans. The Founding Fathers appreciated this and placed explicit protection of certain aspects in the Bill of Rights. But with the invasion of the Internet, maintaining privacy has become difficult, if not impossible. You have cookies collecting and storing data about you each time you visit a site. You have browsers that track the pages you visit. Google “scans” your emails. You have “widgets” on sites that can see which sites you visit. The spying possibilities are endless. There are ways to avoid this, such as deleting cookies and using anonymous browsers, although they are often difficult and not foolproof. It is dangerous to treat the Internet as a private business because online companies store and may share sensitive information about you; hackers and others, if knowledgeable, can steal this personal information stored online; and if you think the Internet is private, you're more likely to share personal information that you'd prefer others didn't know. Whether you know it or not, advertising, social media, and browser companies (especially Google) collect information about you. with every click, like, email, tweet, post, search and pin. This is supposed to help tailor your Internet experience by showing you ads based on your interests, showing you other related sites and posts you might like, and personalizing your searches, so that when you type a letter, previous searches starting with that letter appear. Robert Epstein of US News says: "Google can and does monitor people – perhaps more than 90% of the world's internet users – whether or not they use a Google product, and most people don't have a paper... ...information they would probably prefer not to find everywhere. Do you really want your personal information stored online by companies you don't even know exist? With the Internet, this statement is entirely possible. Work cited by Epstein, Robert. Google's Gotcha: 15 ways Google is monitoring you. Newspaper. Dow Jones & Company, August 7, 2010. Web. May 6, 2014. Kirkpatrick, David: The inside story of the company that connects the world: Simon & Schuster, 2010. Print.Pagliery. , Jose. “Online privacy is dead. » CNNMoney, October 17, 2013. Web, April 28, 2014. Sullivan, Bob “Online Privacy Fears Are Real.” NBC News, December 6, 2013. Web. April 29. 2014.