I am worried about my privacy online after a podcast that described some horror stories of people's user data being published by internet providers and shops.

Notable example was the AOL search data that compromised the security of 1000s of their users:



source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AOL_search_data_leak

Everyday our data is being sold to companies, and I cannot be sure it might not fall into the hands of unsavory characters.

How do I protect myself and my IP address?

What you need is Tor: www.torproject.org/

Tor (short for The onion router) is a system intended to enable online anonymity. Tor client software routes Internet traffic through a worldwide volunteer network of servers in order to conceal a user's location or usage from anyone conducting network surveillance or traffic analysis. Using Tor makes it more difficult to trace Internet activity, including "visits to Web sites, online posts, instant messages and other communication forms", back to the user and is intended to protect users' personal freedom, privacy, and ability to conduct confidential business by keeping their internet activities from being monitored.