Google's new privacy policy
Mar. 1st, 2012 11:46 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
purplecatNot entirely getting the panic.
I fully recognise that there are probably some people who were relying in an important way on Google Search, Google Mail, YouTube and Blogger keeping their information separate. However Google has given lots of warning that the change is coming, and I don't see any reason in principle why a web-based company should not share information between all its web-based services so long as it's up-front about the fact. So I find it hard to work up even the low-level sense of outrage I occasionally manage when Facebook springs some sweeping change to privacy settings on me.
I do, of course, see that Google's emphasis on "real names only" for Google+ etc may prevent people with legitimate reasons to operate pseudonymously when online from accessing Google's other services. But its real names policy seems to me to be tangential to the issue of linking its data. Obviously the issues interact, but I see more reason to fight the real names only policy than to fight the new privacy policy.
What I'm really not clear about is why it is particularly important that I, personally, take various steps (or should have done since it's now March 1st and so I'm basically doomed) to scrub my information from all Google's platforms. I mean this is the company whose search engine (when it confesses to knowing anything about me at all) thinks I'm a man, between the ages of 25 and 35 who's main interests are computer games, American football and women's clothing. I wouldn't actually be complaining if they could join a few more dots than that, to be honest. I should really re-check it, come to think of it, and see if, now they've linked my web search to my Google+ account, they've managed to work out I'm female.
Maybe I'm failing to see the panic because I'm moderately careful about who gets what personal information anyway, and have never assumed that any company (especially one based in the US) is going to keep it entirely secure and inviolate. I also suspect I tend to over-estimate rather than under-estimate the ease with which my online identities could be linked. Frankly, I was surprised to learn that Google+ wasn't already linked up with Blogger, YouTube and Search!!
Maybe I'm failing to see the panic simply because I don't really use most of these services. I use search a lot, I post videos for family to YouTube, but my usage of all the over services is minimal to non-existent.
I fully recognise that there are probably some people who were relying in an important way on Google Search, Google Mail, YouTube and Blogger keeping their information separate. However Google has given lots of warning that the change is coming, and I don't see any reason in principle why a web-based company should not share information between all its web-based services so long as it's up-front about the fact. So I find it hard to work up even the low-level sense of outrage I occasionally manage when Facebook springs some sweeping change to privacy settings on me.
I do, of course, see that Google's emphasis on "real names only" for Google+ etc may prevent people with legitimate reasons to operate pseudonymously when online from accessing Google's other services. But its real names policy seems to me to be tangential to the issue of linking its data. Obviously the issues interact, but I see more reason to fight the real names only policy than to fight the new privacy policy.
What I'm really not clear about is why it is particularly important that I, personally, take various steps (or should have done since it's now March 1st and so I'm basically doomed) to scrub my information from all Google's platforms. I mean this is the company whose search engine (when it confesses to knowing anything about me at all) thinks I'm a man, between the ages of 25 and 35 who's main interests are computer games, American football and women's clothing. I wouldn't actually be complaining if they could join a few more dots than that, to be honest. I should really re-check it, come to think of it, and see if, now they've linked my web search to my Google+ account, they've managed to work out I'm female.
Maybe I'm failing to see the panic because I'm moderately careful about who gets what personal information anyway, and have never assumed that any company (especially one based in the US) is going to keep it entirely secure and inviolate. I also suspect I tend to over-estimate rather than under-estimate the ease with which my online identities could be linked. Frankly, I was surprised to learn that Google+ wasn't already linked up with Blogger, YouTube and Search!!
Maybe I'm failing to see the panic simply because I don't really use most of these services. I use search a lot, I post videos for family to YouTube, but my usage of all the over services is minimal to non-existent.
(no subject)
Date: 2012-03-01 01:23 pm (UTC)Mind you, I'm not wholly sure I want people to have access to my browser history!
(no subject)
Date: 2012-03-01 02:20 pm (UTC)However now, when running their algorithms to target ads at you Google Search can take a peek at what you've been looking at on YouTube to tailor those ads, and YouTube can take a peek at your Google Search history in order to tailor those ads. In the event that Google were to buy up LJ or FaceBook or something then presumably that data would go into the big melting pot as well. But its all still Google if you take my meaning, and the safety of your data still basically depends upon the extent to which Google is both competent and ethical.
If it worries you at all, clearing out your browser's cookies regularly will make it a lot harder for Google to track you since it is via cookies that it identifies that you are the same person it saw last time. It can now potentially track you if you log into one of its services and then perform a search so, again, if it worries you don't log into any Google owned services or, if you do, clear out your cookies both before and after you do so.
If you want to know the information Google has stored about you then it's privacy dashboard is a good place to start.
(no subject)
Date: 2012-03-01 02:24 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2012-03-01 02:28 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2012-03-01 02:23 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2012-03-01 02:27 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2012-03-01 02:31 pm (UTC)Mind you, I have some friends it got spot on.
(no subject)
Date: 2012-03-01 02:39 pm (UTC)