Your privacy restored

Ever Googled yourself and thought, “What the heck is that doing online?” Old addresses, phone numbers and even the car you drive are all out there. Worse, it’s probably on some sketchy people search site or buried in a mountain of search results.

I’ve been there too. After I went on a mission to wipe my info from every site I could find, I barely made a dent. That’s when I found Incogni.

The solution that works

I started with Incogni’s standard service. They send opt-out requests to 250+ data broker sites. Watching that removal list grow felt amazing. No more spam calls or texts cluttering up my phone, either. But some of the worst offenders, like search engine results, aren’t part of this deal.

So, I upgraded to Incogni Unlimited, which took things to the next level. You can submit links to specific sites where your info is shown. Spot yourself on a people search page? Just send it to Incogni. They’ll handle it until, poof, it’s gone.

You got the power

Before you say, “Kim, this sounds like a lot of work.” It isn’t. Incogni makes submissions a breeze.

Here’s how to do it:

  1. Copy the URL where you see your info.
  2. Paste it into your Incogni dashboard.
  3. Their team checks if it’s eligible (spoiler: it usually is).
  4. They reach out and sort out the removal for you.
  5. You get a notification when it’s done.

Submit as many links as you want. Unlike other services that cap you, Incogni lets you go wild.

Is there anything they can’t remove?

Some sites are off-limits, like government records, criminal conviction reports or social media accounts. But almost everything else is fair game.

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Gadget or gimmick? The truth behind viral tech products

Oh, it’s Friday. Let’s lighten our tech brains and hearts. 

Every week, some new gadget promises to make your life easier. There’s a fine line though between “tech that improves your life” and “tech that ends up in a junk drawer next to the USB lava lamp.”

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Talk is cheap

📱 And these phone goodies for under $30 are calling your name.

  • Apple or Android? This portable charger (33% off) has the juice for both.
  • Blast your jams on a phone stand (25% off) that doubles as a speaker.
  • Bring your older ride up to speed with a Bluetooth adapter (31% off).
  • Travel light with a cross-body phone bag (26% off) to carry just the basics.
  • Keep your family’s phones splash-free with waterproof pouches (15% off).

✨ Tech it or leave it: Swing by my page for even more of my handpicked tech faves.

🏡 Safe & sound: Protecting your home takes more than just locking the front door. I trust SimpliSafe, the award-winning security system that’s actually easy to set up and use. Don’t wait for a break-in to get serious about your family’s safety.

6 hours

Per day with family. That’s part of a scientific formula for the perfect day (paywall link). You should also spend two hours with friends, two hours exercising and one hour eating and drinking. Work? Keep it under six hours, and screen time under one. It might not be realistic, but hey, life’s supposed to be about balance, right?

📵 This will be on the test: Do your kids have Androids? School Time on Google Family Link keeps them focused by turning off notifications and limiting apps. Select your child, tap the Screen time (three bars) > Schedules > School time. You can set breaks for lunch, recess or vacations, too.

How to spot hidden spyware, and kick it out for good

Ever get the feeling someone knows too much about what you’re doing online? I’m not talking about the sarcastic “My FBI agent is amused” way, but in the “Why did my phone just text my ex and order dog food at 2 a.m.?” kind of way. 

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Real-life prompts that go way beyond work, from sleep to date night

After I shared my list of the best AI prompts for work, the comments poured in. “OK, Kim, but what about real life?” 

What, my work life isn’t real enough for you? Kidding, great question! You know AI can plan a trip and meals or write a to-do list. But let’s go beyond that. 

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Ready, set, let’s go

🥳 Amazon’s Big Spring Sale has everything for epic family fun.

🐶 Fetch and chase: When your pets get the zoomies, toss a glow-in-the-dark bouncy ball (41% off). Your cat would probably prefer a laser (24% off).

💔 Tinder swindler alert: A Portland woman lost over $40,000 after falling for a scammer she met on the app. They talked for a week before he asked for money, saying he had no family to help, sealing the con with a fake photo of himself in a hospital bed. Tinder’s basically a financial thriller with worse dialogue than a Lifetime movie.

🤖 OpenAI is retiring GPT-4 from ChatGPT: Slated to be fully replaced by April 30 by the current default model, GPT-4o, because, well, 4o is just better. It’s stronger at writing, coding, problem-solving and conversational flow. Farewell, GPT-4. We’ll remember your weird poem phase. More models are on the way; we’ll soon see a family of GPT-4.1s and a new o3 “reasoning” bot. 

▶️ Sharing is caring: Tired of ads on YouTube? Get the YouTube Premium Family Plan for $22.99 a month and split it with up to five friends. That’s $4.60 each for perks like background play, offline downloads and YouTube Music Premium.

What to stream now

I don’t know about you, but when Friday hits, the last thing I want to do is scroll for an hour trying to find something to watch. Usually, I give up and rewatch The Office for the 10th time. 

Not this weekend. I made you a watch list, meticulously crafted between dopamine crashes, for the entertainment-decision-deficient among us. You’re welcome.

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👨‍👩‍👧‍👦 Eyes on your teens: If your kid is between 13 and 17, set up Supervision on Instagram. You or your teen can send the invite by going to your profile, tapping Menu (three lines) > Family Center > Invite your teen. Find their name and hit Invite. Then, open their account and tap the invite > Next > Allow. Simple.

🧑‍🧒‍🧒 FamilySearch: This free site from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints lets you build a family tree and dig into your genealogy. It’s open to everyone, no matter your religious background. 

Calling fellow tricksters: I love a prank. Hit my list of April Fools’ tech tricks to make your friends and family laugh, groan and say, “How the heck did you do that?” Love the super slo-o-o-w Alexa.

Tech how-to: Delete your DNA data

You can freeze your credit. Change your password. Replace a stolen phone. But there’s one thing you can’t ever change: your DNA.

That’s why the news that 23andMe just filed for bankruptcy should set off alarms. This company collected genetic information from over 15 million people. Yours could be sold as part of bankruptcy proceedings, absorbed into a merger or leaked in a breach. You’ll never know until it’s too late.

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Student in the family? A student Amazon Prime account is a heck of a lot cheaper than the regular price. Students get six months free, and then it’s half off a year ($69).

00Heaven: Meet the big guns producing the next Bond film. Amazon picked Amy Pascal from Spider-Man and David Heyman, who’s behind Harry Potter. This’ll be the first time the Broccoli family won’t take charge since Amazon MGM got the rights from them. Who do you want as the next Bond girl? Sorry, I’m way too busy.

Remember Ruby Franke? She’s an evil mommy vlogger who went to prison last year for abusing and starving her kids. New laws are in the works to stop parents from using their kids for clicks. If a parent makes over $150K a year from family content, they must put some money into a trust (paywall link). Once kids hit 18, they can ask for old videos to be taken down. About time.