Slashdot Mirror


Last Day To Tell Google To Forget You

itwbennett writes "Google's new privacy policy will consolidate all your data at google.com — unless you erase it first. And today is your last day to do it. The change goes into effect tomorrow. Which is why the helpful folks at EFF have posted some simple instructions showing how to delete your web history at Google."

10 of 238 comments (clear)

  1. Done. by NIN1385 · · Score: 5, Funny

    I already did this years ago, but thank you for pointing it out to those who were not aware of such a setting. I'm sure the government is still monitoring all of this through Echelon though, which makes this meaningless.

    Did I say that out loud? Shit sorry.

    --

    If carrots got you drunk, rabbits would be fucked up. - Comedian Mitch Hedberg R.I.P. 03/30/68-2/24/05
    1. Re:Done. by mrstrano · · Score: 5, Funny

      Ha! Echelon! Didn't you get the memo? The project was renamed about 8 years ago, now it's called Facebook.

  2. "Paused" web history. by Animats · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Just did that. But I'd done it already, and Google claims my web history is "paused". Which probably means they will "unpause" it silently at some future time.

    There's this annoying trend towards invisible buttons for things web sites don't want you to do. There's no obvious "sign out" button for Google now. Clicking on your user name will get you to a sign-out option, but it's not obvious. Facebook actually has invisible buttons for opting out of ads. (They're at the right of the ad headline. Mouse over that blank area and a "x" will appear. Click on the "x" and some opt-out options will appear. They don't actually make the advertiser go away, though.)

  3. Re:Sign into my what? by supersat · · Score: 5, Informative

    If you're not signed in, they store your history for 180 days, but you can opt-out of that without a Google account: http://www.google.com/history/optout

  4. i told them to forget me by nimbius · · Score: 5, Insightful

    about a year ago when i closed my google account(s). same with facebook, although if their shadow-profiling is any indication of 'how its done' then you can expect google to start silently tracking the same inferential data about you as a person instead..

    either may have started as amicable services, but both have rapidly evolved into a flagrant, unapologetic breeches of privacy.

    --
    Good people go to bed earlier.
  5. Re:Today is Feb. 29? by Chemisor · · Score: 5, Funny

    Yes, many people have trouble adjusting to leap years.

  6. Re:Cee-Lo Green said it best. by Kozz · · Score: 5, Funny

    We're all adults here..

    You must be new here.

    --
    I only post comments when someone on the internet is wrong.
  7. Re:Today is Feb. 29? by Baloroth · · Score: 5, Funny

    They're just making it easier for when they dupe this story next week. They won't even have to change the summary at all!

    --
    "None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license." --John Milton
  8. Of little to no consequence by arisvega · · Score: 5, Informative

    From their website (http://support.google.com/accounts/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=54067):

    You can remove all Web History from your Google Account at any time. While signed in to your Google Account:

    Go to google.com/history.new window

    Click Remove all web history.

    However, as is common practice in the industry, and as outlined in the Google Privacy Policy, Google maintains a separate logs system for auditing purposes and to help us improve the quality of our services for users.

    (emphasis mine)

    --
    The three laws of thermodynamics:(1) You can't win. (2) You can't break even. (3) You can't even quit.
  9. No. Today is still Feb. 22. by tomzyk · · Score: 5, Funny

    You obviously haven't read the fine-print in their new agreement. One of the updates is that GoogleCalendar is changing. Months always start on Thursdays from now on. And there will be 14 months per year. Google's moon-base is still working on speeding up the moon's revolution, but it should be ready [out of Beta] by the end of 2012.

    --
    Karma: NaN