News about PRISM, Verizon data collection, and other government surveillance has flooded media outlets for the last week, leaving U.S. citizens and members of the international community feeling uncomfortable with the volume and methods of data collection that have been revealed.

Christopher Reynolds of IVPN lends his advice to TechSpot readers on how to gain some ground on the battle for internet privacy, but also raises the point that our own apathy may be the biggest barrier to protecting our privacy online. I've tried many tools, plugins, and browsing practices in an attempt to gain some semblance of anonymity and privacy, but the fact of the matter is, it's very inconvenient. Blocking scripts and cookies reduces or eliminates functionality on many websites, and VPN's are typically some fraction of the speed of a the parent connection.

As a technologically inclined and informed population, we're curious what measures you take to protect your privacy online, or, maybe you're among those who are comfortable with the data that's being collected. Let us know the steps you take to protect yourself in the comments, or why you don't feel it's necessary.