How To Get Rid Of Ads On Samsung Galaxy Phones & Disable Them Altogether if Using a Samsung Account!
Samsung serves up ads on their phones, but I've never seen one on my Galaxy devices. This is how you can save yourself from the annoyance.
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Links:
https://terms.account.samsung.com/contents/legal/us/en/customizedservicecontent.html
https://9to5google.com/2021/02/09/samsung-galaxy-ads-turn-off/
https://www.androidpolice.com/2020/07/04/ads-are-taking-over-samsungs-galaxy-smartphones-and-im-fed-up/ https://lifehacker.com/how-to-get-rid-of-samsungs-ads-on-your-galaxy-phone-1844281263
https://www.computerworld.com/article/3514999/samsung-selling-data.html https://www.xda-developers.com/samsung-pay-selling-data-opt-out/
https://www.reddit.com/r/galaxys10/comments/ha21j8/how_to_removeavoid_ads_in_samsung_phones_check_my/
Let's do a quick poll: If you own a Samsung phone, have you experienced having Samsung push native advertising in your face on your device to promote their own products? If you DON'T own a Samsung phone, how would you react to that?
Tons of users in the last year or so have experienced this, but I haven't... and I think I know why. So if you've been getting Samsung ads on your Galaxy phone or tablet, I hope this video will help you understand why they are there, and how to get rid of them.
So when you're buying a plus $1000 phone, the last thing you'd expect is for the manufacturer to also throw advertisements at you to buy their devices. These ads pop up on the default apps and within the notifications bar.
Why are they there? According to Samsung's Customization Service, Samsung uses the data it collects about you through their apps to display customized advertisements about products and services that may be of interest to you.
We've also been warned that Samsung may be selling your data to third parties. According to XDA Developers, a toggle to "Do not sell" showed up in the Samsung Pay app, not long after CCPA (california's privacy act) went into affect.
Many users have reported that they disabled the Customization Service options in the settings but they still get the ads. So why don't I get them? I think it's because I never agreed to them in the first place. I never had to turn them off because they never showed up in the first place.
See, once you've set up your phone and started getting ads, you can only really disable that customization service - meaning you will no longer get personalized ads... but you'll still get ads. So this is actually something that you have to solve before it becomes a problem.
If that's what you want to do... go into your settings, then tap on Samsung Account, Privacy. Scroll to the Customization Service option, then go to Privacy Settings. Beside the section called Customized Ads and Direct Marketing, toggle the setting to off. If you've never turned on this setting before, you'll see a popup that says "personalize your apps". Leave that option disabled and back out of there.
A second option is to open the Samsung members app, click on the 3 dot menu in the upper right corner, choose settings, disable marketing information. Also open settings, apps, Samsung push service, notifications, and disable marketing. In the Galaxy Store, click the hamburger menu icon in the top left, tap the settings icon, and disable the news and special offers and customization settings. Under notifications in that app, turn off promotions.
Next, go to settings, accounts and backup, manage accounts, samsung account, profile info, and scroll down to preferences and disable "get news and special offers". You can also open settings, Privacy, and disable customization service and any marketing options.
Here's my pro tip though: Every single one of these options will already be disabled if you set up your phone with a little bit of patience. When I was setting up my s21 Ultra, I screenshot every single place I ran across where Samsung wanted to serve me up some ads and I refused. In each of these cases, when you first sign into your samsung account and open these apps, the first page will have these ENTIRELY OPTIONAL bullets that Samsung just expects you to click without reading. But if you read them, each of them is totally optional.
I actually went through and tried to find a bunch of them to show you but first, check out these ways you can support this free content... or skip ahead using the chapter markers here on youtube.
Here's the ones I've found. When you first sign into your samsung account - leave "customization service" unchecked. Leave get news and special offers unchecked. I even left that "offline finding" disabled and hit agree.
This one is for the Galaxy Store - "Get news and special offers" - leave that unchecked then hit agree.
This Samsung TV Plus Watch app - it had TWO optional marketing bullets. Leave 'em blank, don't hit All, and just skip them and hit agree. If you use Galaxy Themes, same thing. Marketing Choice down here at the bottom - that's optional. Leave it blank and hit continue.
With the Galaxy Buds Pro - I left that option unchecked even though it doesn't say anything about ads - in my opinion, the less data I'm allowing Samsung to collect, the less info they'll have on me to potentially target me with ads.
Even when you set up the Weather widget - you may see that "Personalize Your Apps" popup. Leave it disabled. You don't have to turn it on, so don't.
In my humble opinion, Samsung shouldn't be pushing ads at you after you've spent upwards of two grand for a flagship phone. It's intrusive and leaves a bad taste in my mouth. While they are allowed to collect and sell data as long as you agree to it, they do it in a very sketchy way which plays on users just clicking agree to everything and not actually reading the terms of the agreement.
The end all be all fix is to factory reset your phone, and take a much more patient approach to setting it up. Read each page that you're agreeing to before you hit OK. And HOPEFULLY, you'll be able to enjoy your Galaxy phone like I do - ad free.