A Few Points About Google You Should Know!
Have you ever thought about who knows everything about you? For example, where are you right now, and what are you doing? Or even where you were and what you were doing two years ago at this time? Well, the answer is definitely no one. Because even you don’t remember, for instance, what you were doing on May 29, 2023, at 3 PM. But I must say, unfortunately, there is one person who knows, and that person is none other than Google. READ More: Google Family Link Review 2023.
If you go to Google Maps Timeline, you will also know. Google will tell you which photos you took that day. What mode of transportation did you use to travel from one location to another? Did you walk? Did you take a bus? Did you drive? Or… But this is not the only thing that Google knows.
If you go to the “My Activity” section, Google will show all your activities for a specific day. Which websites you visited, and which videos you watched? It even records your voice for better recognition. It knows what topics you are interested in. Which apps do you use, and even more!!
Most of you know that Google is aware of your online purchases. But they went a step further. If you use the Google Pay service, it will also know about your offline purchases. They track your offline purchases. Then, they compare them with their online advertisements and will know whether their ads have influenced your purchase or not. Or, based on your offline purchases, what products should they recommend to you?
The problem is that even if you don’t use Google Chrome, YouTube, or Gmail, you will still be under Google’s radar. This is because you might be using Android, and for Google to improve the user experience, it needs to analyze your activities.
Perhaps you shouldn’t be worried because Google only keeps an eye on your actions. For example, they don’t know what’s on your mind or what you’re thinking about. Unfortunately, they are working hard to achieve such a thing and are almost there.
You might wonder what Google knows about us when looking at most of today’s technologies and the questions raised initially. Although various data occupy internet bandwidth, a specific type of information is being collected as profitable data. Like other tech giants, Google collects a vast amount of personal data to profit from its services and processes.
This tech giant is astonishingly developing and collecting your personal data to create a complete and flawless picture of you and your life.
What does Google know!?
In the infographic below, you will see what Google knows about you, how it collects this information, and of course, find several ways to stop this tracking through Google.
Among all the apps, services, Android operating systems, etc., Google can easily access all your personal information and have a flawless profile of you on the internet, and monitor all your activities.
Google, like Facebook, personalizes the information collected from you and uses it to display advertisements based on your needs and interests, no matter what purposes you use the internet for.
These ads are displayed in Google searches, on your mobile page, Gmail service, YouTube, or other Google-related services.
How much does Google know about me?
Google used to be just a search engine. Remember? You probably still use Google Search a lot. And Google collects a lot of data about your searches.
You’re right, as it says a lot about you. Log in and go to Google and view the search history that Google has about you. It is also possible to view your search history on YouTube from this location.
More basic but also vital information can be found in the details of your account. Log in and go to the About Google Account page to see the initial information you have given to Google. Go to the dashboard and you can see the history of a collection of Google tools and your activity with them. We will click on a few of these items later, but suffice it to say that this dashboard is important for finding information that Google knows about you.
This is the initial information that Google probably keeps about you:
- Your name, gender, and date of birth
- Your email addresses
- Your phone numbers
- Where you live
- Where you work
- Websites you have visited
- Searches you have performed on Google Search
- Your selected ad settings
- Your interests
- Places you have visited around the world
- Your YouTube search history and videos you have recently watched
- What you’ve told the Google Assistant, including through smart speakers
Other services
Some other notable services are:
- All your Google Assistant requests are also stored, and you can listen to the audio files.
- Your Google Keep lists are also saved, but only the latest saved state of them is available.
- The time and date of Google Lens searches are saved, but there are no images of what your camera has pointed to.
- Podcast subscriptions and the time and name of the podcast you’ve listened to are also saved, but there’s no information about the exact episode.
- Reminders that Google had announced to you, including what has been reminded and when it was.
Creating a unique profile of you and your life
Here we have summarized some data that Google knows about you:
- Who you are: Google knows what your face looks like, recognizes your voice, knows your political and religious beliefs, and is aware of your eye health. This search giant knows if you have a child or even if you have a specific diet.
- Where you have been: Google knows your location at any moment through tracking, where your workplace is, and even which cities you have traveled to. Your friends: Google knows who you have talked to on the phone, what you talked about, and knows who you have been with and where.
- It knows your interests and tastes: Based on your Google search results, it knows what food, books, movies, videos, and stories you like and which ones you don’t.
- It knows your plans for the future: Your search results tell an exciting story about you and what’s on your mind, and your future plans are included. Have you searched for a training course on Google? Then Google knows what plans you have for the future, such as a course on becoming better parents, indicating your plans for marriage and having children.
- Your online life: Google knows all the websites you visit. Your data is stored, and bookmarked sites are also included in your profile information.
Google job advertisement
One Google ad reads, “No registration required; we have all your information!” which is really surprising and scary. Nowadays, technology has penetrated people’s lives in such a way that these technology companies can access all aspects of people’s lives.
Withdrawal!
If you want to reduce Google’s access to your information now, we have prepared a few solutions for you:
- Set up privacy settings
- Use private browsing in the browser
- Use another browser
- Disable location services
- Delete your Google account
- Use a reliable VPN
Although much of the information Google stores about you have no value and are never used, Google continues to store this information to potentially use it for political or commercial purposes in businesses in the future. Anyway, it’s your right to know what information Google has about you.
Conclusion:
In summary, almost every input you’ve entered in a Google service has been logged in one way or another. In addition, a category of data that you passively broadcast is also saved. As I mentioned before, this is just what we are allowed to see. The big picture that Google has put together from these puzzle pieces is interesting, but we probably will never see it.
How do you feel knowing this? I have more or less accepted that Google will often know more about my actions than I do.
Some of you are probably disabling these services while reading these paragraphs. That’s why we decided to write this article in the first place. The vast majority of users use these services without thinking about what’s happening behind the scenes.
Well, if you are in the second group, now you know! Accept the reality of the digital age or look for a remote cabin on faraway islands!
After learning all these things, do you dare to investigate the information Google knows about us? If the answer is yes, let us know in the comments section what interesting things you’ve found! READ More: Google Family Link Review 2023.
