Using your birth date in apps and websites

Beginner's Guide to Privacy and Security

Best practices and recommendations on how to protect and recover from compromised accounts and computers, use real-world scenarios to detail how scams and phishing emails are used and provide best practices on how to use the internet in a more safe and secure manner to protect yourself, your family, and your clients.

A Beginner's Guide to Privacy and Security

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A lot of websites we use or the apps we download on our phone, tablet, computer, video game consoles, streaming media player, etc. ask for our birthday. With the rate at which apps and websites have security issues, think about the risk vs. reward when providing your birthday to them.

It comes down to 2 options

Important sites/apps
- Bank accounts
- Retirement accounts
- Medical/doctor accounts
- Insurance
- Mortgage
- Income taxes
- Etc.
Non-important sites/apps
- Social Media
- Local stores
- Local restaurants
- Lawn care
- Photo editing
- Etc.

For important sites, you are often required to verify your identity (your exact birthday) when creating an account, so you don’t have a choice. Not to mention, those accounts (sites/apps) are important to your life as they hold your money, medical records, etc. You have a lot to lose if asked to verify your identity later, so we would always recommend using your real birthday on those types of accounts.

However, if it is a non-important website or app, I would suggest entering in a fake birthday. I’ve had some people ask, but what about when my local restaurant that gives me a free meal on my birthday? While I think your identity is much more important than a free meal, I understand a free meal can be very beneficial. I would suggest using the correct month, but pick a fake day and year. Your restaurant doesn’t need to know the exact date or year. Using the same month helps you remember when to ask for your free meal, especially if they ask for your ID, but the exact date or year isn’t critical.

Another quick example would be Facebook. Facebook asks for your birthday so they can (something to the effect of) ensure you get the right experience. I would argue the only thing they would need from your birth date to provide you with age relevant content would be the year. Maybe the month would help for some things, but for the most part they should only use the year you were born to direct content. If you are concerned, maybe use the exact year, but would pick a fake day and month for sure. Personally, I would pick a year, or two, off (up or down) of my birth date and wouldn’t provide them with any exact numbers.

If you use a password manager, you could enter in the birth date you used in the notes section (if there is one). To learn more about password managers, check out our blog post on password managers in our Security 101 series.

Logical Cybersecurity

Logical Cybersecurity

Beginner's Guide to Privacy and Security

Logical Cybersecurity

A Beginner's Guide to Privacy and Security

Logical Cybersecurity