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The 5-minute Personal Privacy Check

A personal privacy checklist for everyday life.

How much of your everyday setup is working for you — and how much is reporting on you? Answer 13 questions about your browser, network, and daily habits. You’ll get a score, a breakdown, and suggestions tied to your actual answers, with links to guides.

A free self-assessment. This checklist does not scan your device or measure your fingerprint. No email gate or account required.

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Checking your team? Use the teams checklist →

Your self-assessment

Take stock of your setup.

0 of 13 answered

Choose the closest answer to your current habits. Each question contributes 0–2 points; higher is better within this checklist. If you’re unsure, use the answer that says so. You can go back and change your choices.

01 / 03

Your browser

Start with the browser, accounts, and stored data that travel between your visits.

Which browser do you use most day-to-day?

Think about the browser you actually use, with its current settings. Brave is also Chromium-based; choose it in the second answer.

Are you signed into your browser for account sync?

Browser sync and signing into a website are different. Both can connect activity, but this question is about the browser account.

How do you handle cookies and site data?

Clearing data or isolating it between contexts limits stored identifiers. It does not remove a browser fingerprint or hide a login.

What’s installed in your browser?

Built-in protection counts. A minimal browser is not worse simply because it has no extensions; not every extension is detectable by every site.

Do you use the same browser profile for work, personal life, shopping, and sensitive reading?

Profiles separate some local state. Logging into the same account in both can reconnect those contexts.

02 / 03

Your network

Review your connection and phone. A private route and a well-maintained device protect different parts of your activity.

Do you use a VPN?

Price is not evidence of privacy. An audit covers a scope and time period; it is not a lifetime guarantee. A VPN also shifts trust to its provider.

What handles your DNS lookups?

Encrypted DNS protects the route to a resolver. That resolver can still see the lookups, and other traffic can reveal destinations.

On public Wi-Fi — cafes, airports, hotels — you…

HTTPS protects content in transit even on public Wi-Fi. A VPN does not make a phishing site, unsafe download, or captive portal trustworthy.

What does your phone run?

Security updates, verified boot, and permissions matter more than a “de-Googled” label. This is a privacy rubric, not an operating-system security ranking.

03 / 03

Your accounts & habits

Look at the everyday services that hold your searches, conversations, and recovery keys.

What’s your default search engine?
Where is your primary email hosted?

Encryption in transit, encrypted storage, and end-to-end encryption are different. Messages to ordinary external recipients are not automatically end-to-end encrypted.

How do you protect passwords and important account logins?

Think about your primary email and other important accounts. Passkeys and security keys can provide phishing-resistant sign-in; SMS is still better than no second factor.

What’s your default messaging app?

Message content, backups, contact discovery, and metadata have different protections. An app name alone does not establish how a particular conversation is protected.

What the score means

A starting point, not a verdict.

20–26 points

Tight.

You report fewer gaps. Confirm your assumptions with evidence: explore the public leaderboard to see what websites collect, then use the local demos to inspect selected signals from your own browser.

10–19 points

Exposed in places.

Your answers point to several places worth reviewing. Start with the cheapest fixes: search engine, browser profile separation, and cookie clearing — then work down your suggestions.

0–9 points

Your browser is doing the talking.

Gaps across the setup. Don’t try to fix everything: pick three suggestions below and make them this week.

Each question has the same two-point weight. Browser contributes 10 points, Network 8, and Accounts & habits 8. The weights reflect editorial priorities for everyday privacy; they are not a validated risk model. Your needs, existing protections, and the people you want privacy from may call for different choices. A lower score is a prompt to review a choice, not a requirement to buy a service or replace a supported device.

Read the personal privacy next-steps guide →Checking your team? →