If You’ve Ever Shared a Spotify Link Publicly, You Need to Disable Spotify DMs

Spotify wants to be another messaging platform, but its new DM system has a quirk that makes me hesitate to recommend it. Spotify was an identity-based platform, but things changed once it added messaging. From now on, the Spotify DM system attaches account information to song links and puts it before user’s eyes. This means that he can accidentally flee the photo of the name and the profile of anyone who shared a link, even if they did not intend to give information from their account as well. Fortunately, there is a way to make links more private and completely deactivate Spotify DMS.

How Spotify accidentally flees user information

It all starts with follow -up URLs. Many large companies on the web use them. They integrate information at the end of an URL to follow where the clicks come. Which website, which page, or in the case of Spotify, which user. If you have generated a sharing link for a song or a reading list in the past, it contained your user identity chain at the end. And when someone accessed and acted on this link, adding the song or playing them, your account information was recorded in the identity of their account in a way a connection. Perhaps a little invasive, but because users could not do much with this information, it was above all a way for Spotify to follow the frequency to which people shared music between them.

Before, it happened in the background and no one really cared about it. But with the new Spotify DM functionality, the connections established via follow -up links are suddenly placed in front and in the center just before the eyes of users. As spotted by the Reddit user u / sporoni122These connections now appear in a “suggested” section when you use Spotify DMS, even if you just clicked on a public link once and never heard of the person who shared it. Alternatively, you may have shared a link in the past and could be displayed account information for people who have clicked on it.

Even if an account is public, I could see how it would be boring. Imagine that you share a song in a Discord server where you are going by an anonymous name, but someone clicks on it and finds your Spotify account, where you could take your real name. Bam, they suddenly know who you are.

The Reddit U / Reeceeboii user added that Spotify uses this URL tracking behavior to fill in a list of songs and reading lists shared between two users even if they have occurred via third -party messaging services like WhatsApp.

How to remove links from links before sharing the Spotify reading lists

So, if you don’t want others to find your Spotify account via your shared songs, what are you doing? Well, before publishing in anonymous communities like Discord or X, first try to clean your links.

My colleagues and I have already written on how you can delete the URL tracking information automatically on iPhone,, How you can use a Mac application To clean links without any effort, or how you can use An all-in extension To do the work, whatever the platform. You can also use a website like Bond To clean your links.

Or you can adopt the manual approach. In your Spotify link, delete everything at the end, starting with the question mark.

So this link followed:

https://open.spatify.com/playlist/74bui79bzfkw7ivjbbshrfd?si=28575ba800324

Becomes this clean link:

https://open.spatify.com/playlist/74bui79bzfkw7ivjbshrfd

Here, the part with “Si =” is your identifier. Of course, if it is a reading list that you share, it will always show your name and your profile photo – this is how the platform has always worked. So if you want to be really anonymous, you will want to keep your private reading lists.

How to deactivate Spotify DMS

If you don’t see yourself using Spotify DMS, it could also be a good idea to simply get rid of it. You will probably still want to delete monitoring information from your URLs before sharing, just for reasonable diligence. But if you don’t want to worry about getting DMS on Spotify or showing your account as a suggested contact to foreigners, you should also go to Parameters > Confidentiality and social > Social characteristics and deactivate Messages. This will completely remove you from the DM function.

Credit: Michelle Ehrhardt