While there are scammers portraying as survey sites, legitimate paid survey sites do not sell your information for any reason.
One question that members of survey panels ask is “do survey sites sell my information?” Many also want to know what they do with the information they ask for.
If you have ever completed surveys on a survey site, you will understand that you need to provide some information before you can join.
After joining several survey sites, I have decided to write this article to address this issue. This article will help you know what you should expect if you want to make money online by completing surveys.
What Information Do Survey Sites Ask For?
When you register to become a member on a survey site, you will need to provide your name and email address.
After you join, you will be required to fill out your profile with more information about yourself. The additional information is basic demographic information such as your interests if you have any diseases if you have a car, your marital status, your income, and your media habits amongst others.
The amount of information that you provide is completely left to you. However, some sites offer a cash bonus to members that fill out all the required information. The size of the bonus is often determined by the amount of information you provide in your profile.
Some survey sites may also ask you to provide your address and phone number when you are signing up. They ask for these because they want to use them to verify that you are not a robot. Before you release any of the information stated above, read this article to the end to find out why it is always not a good idea to provide your personal information.
Why Do Online Survey Sites Request Demographic Details?
When a company wants to carry out a survey, they are interested in getting statistical information about a certain topic or a particular product or service they offer.
To use the information for statistical purposes, they need to know more about the people that will complete the surveys beyond their email addresses. This also helps them to avoid fraud and safeguard the quality of the survey.
The information also helps them to be certain that they are targeting the right group of people with the surveys. For instance, it does not make sense if you participate in a survey about disability if you have no disability. So, the information they ask for is used to ensure that you are provided with surveys that are relevant to you.
However, many survey sites do not use this information efficiently to determine the right surveys for their members. So on some sites, you will still come across surveys that are irrelevant to you, and which you do not qualify for.
A survey site like PaidViewpoint understands how to use members’ profile information to filter the kinds of surveys they offer. On this platform, you will not be sent a survey that you do not qualify for. The drawback to this site is that they do not offer lots of surveys.
Information That Online Survey Sites Collect
The information that survey sites collect include:
- Type of software and computer that you use
- Your location (they will get this from your IP address)
- Website you visited before you decide to join their survey site
- The website you visit after leaving the site.
Survey websites can either use this information separately or they can add them to an accumulation of information about you which the creators have collected or bought.
Other groups of information that survey sites request include
1. Personal Information
If your IP address is connected to any other information, they can easily know your name, your address, as well as other information you have shared (such as information gotten from government records). If the survey is on a site that you have registered with, the survey site can pass your information to them.
People do not hesitate to share their information if the survey site promises a reward since it makes sense that you need to provide the right information provided you win- this implies you give them your email, name, address, phone number, and other personal information that they can use to identify you.
2. Consumer Habits
Survey companies use the idea of offering gifts to make people provide accurate information. Imagine if 60,000 people provide their information with the hope of receiving a reward for doing so. The survey company will rest assured that the information is accurate.
They have used that opportunity to buy the information at a very cheap rate per person.
What looks harmless and sounds great is just a sneaky way to collect information that you wouldn’t have provided. Pay attention to quizzes and surveys on survey sites to understand how this process works.
3. Medical History
What happens if your medical history is sold or shared with an insurance company? Does it mean the information you provide will influence your insurance claims? The answer is yes. Although this can be creepy, however, nothing stops the company from using your data in other ways since there are no terms and conditions about how they can use the data.
If they sell the information to unethical entities, this can lead to identity theft, medical identity theft, and an increase in spam in your email. Now think about what is likely to happen if your employer or the potential employer buys this information.
Do The Survey Sites Sell The Information I Provide?
As you can deduce from the previous section, it is obvious that some survey sites sell their members’ information to third-party sites or companies.
Survey sites provide lots of information for companies, governments, and NGOs to enhance their service and products. They also provide lots of information about the society as well as the opinions of the citizens that can be beneficial to the society.
However, if you register on a legitimate survey site, you don’t have to worry about them selling your details.
Before you join a survey site, ensure it is not a scam site. Scam survey sites are the ones fond of selling their members’ information.
Will I Receive Spam After Registering On Survey Sites?
Generally, you do not have to worry about this. No one can guarantee you that you cannot receive spam. If you are worried about receiving lots of spam after joining survey sites, the steps below will help you secure yourself.
Many survey sites will want to send you an email when there is a survey that you need to fill. So, there are chances that you will receive more emails. That, however, depends on the number of survey sites that you join.
It is good to know when you have an option, especially when you join survey sites to give feedback and get rewarded for it.
How to Avoid Spam Emails
As stated earlier, the steps below will help safeguard you from getting lots of spam after joining survey sites:
1. Be safe when providing information on the internet
The ramifications of sharing sensitive information are far-reaching. Before you take a quiz, complete a survey, answer research questions, or enter sweepstakes, think through all that is involved. If you are not 100 percent sure of the motive behind the questions asked and know how they intend to use your information, do not respond.
Also, if you cannot trust that your information is safe or you have not been given the guarantee that you can remove your information anytime you want, it is better not to respond.
Not sharing the information will save you from harming yourself and your loved ones.
2. Read terms and conditions
As stated earlier, you do not have to worry about legitimate survey sites bombarding you with lots of spam.
However, some sites will bombard you with spam since they would have shared your information. In most cases, you will see this in their terms. So, make it a habit to read the terms and conditions of a survey site before you sign up.
A site like PaidSurveyDepot agrees to receive emails from their partners when you register.
You do not know the number of partners they will share your information with and you may not like when survey sites adopt this type of marketing. However, it is not a survey site but a platform that collects sites and promotes them to its members (also referred to as a survey aggregator).
Before you register on any of our legit survey sites, ensure you check their terms. You can also read their reviews to have a more specific idea about the sites. In the reviews, I have provided all the details that you need to know about them.
3. Register on trusted survey sites
If you ensure that you sign up for legit survey sites, you can be rest assured that they will do all it takes to protect and respect your privacy by not misusing the information you provide.
This is the best way to protect yourself when completing online surveys. Our list of legit survey sites will give you an overview of the best survey platforms that you can sign up to and get paid for completing surveys.
4. Is it necessary to create a new email for surveys?
I usually hear people saying that if you do not want to receive any spam from survey sites or if you want to separate survey offers from the rest of your main emails, then you should create a new email that will be solely meant for surveys.
Although this is an option, it is not necessary. The people that share this idea are usually those that have not completed lots of surveys. Before you do this, be aware that if you want to receive your earnings through PayPal, the survey site will transfer your money to the email that you signed up with.
So, if the email that registered with is different from what you used for your PayPal email, that can lead to series of problems.
Some survey sites give you the option to use a different email address to receive your payment. If you want to use a new email address for surveys, ensure you go through the website’s terms and conditions to ensure that you will be able to withdraw your earnings.
5. Be smart
Just with any activity that you do on the internet, you need to be smart to detect if something sounds or looks strange. When you come across such a scenario, dig deeper before you sign up.
Also, if there is any information that you are asked to provide and you are not willing to give it away, don’t give the information away.
Conclusion
Generally, based on my experience, you do not have to worry about survey websites selling your information. What you need to do is to adhere to the different tips discussed in this article.
If you follow the tips, you will discover that survey platforms are a great way to make extra bucks while sharing your opinion about a specific product or service.
The best way to ensure that you get the best online survey opportunities and securely make extra money is to sign up on legit survey sites in your country.
