Slashdot Mirror
Google Has Quietly Dropped Ban On Personally Identifiable Web Tracking (propublica.org)
Fudge Factor 3000 writes: Google has quietly changed its privacy policy to allow it to associate web tracking, which is supposed to remain anonymous, with personally identifiable user data. This completely reneges its promise to keep a wall between ad tracking and personally identifiable user data, further eroding one's anonymity on the internet. Google's priorities are clear. All they care about is monetizing user information to rake in the big dollars from ad revenue. Think twice before you purchase the premium priced Google Pixel. Google is getting added value from you as its product without giving you part of the revenue it is generating through tracking through lower prices. The crossed-out section in its privacy policy, which discusses the separation of information as mentioned above, has been followed with this statement: "Depending on your account settings, your activity on other sites and apps may be associated with your personal information in order to improve Google's services and the ads delivered by Google." ProPublica reports: "The change is enabled by default for new Google accounts. Existing users were prompted to opt-in to the change this summer. The practical result of the change is that the DoubleClick ads that follow people around on the web may now be customized to them based on your name and other information Google knows about you. It also means that Google could now, if it wished to, build a complete portrait of a user by name, based on everything they write in email, every website they visit and the searches they conduct. The move is a sea change for Google and a further blow to the online ad industry's longstanding contention that web tracking is mostly anonymous. In recent years, Facebook, offline data brokers and others have increasingly sought to combine their troves of web tracking data with people's real names. But until this summer, Google held the line." You can choose to opt in or out of the personalized ads here.
Still the Google engineers who volunteer to implement these things in exchange for good payment and conditions, and excuse themselves as only following their employer's orders.
Most mass anything is the result of willing engineers. We should never forget this, or we end up being the problem.
Why people are so stupid to understand that selling the user's data is the only working business model for free Internet services. User's data is the only asset they hold.
It is so naive to assume that they would not sell anything for which there would be demand.
By and large, this opens up a larger revenue stream for Google with very little backlash from their users.
It will be cussed and discussed on a few noble forums and everyone else will go on with their Facebook world, surrendering personal privacy for access to social media and the Google search engine.
Keep that in mind every time you log into Slashdot.
We live in an age where connecting points A1 - Z1,000,000 is easy to do. And with every business monetizing their users' data, privacy on the web is nonexistent. Why do you think just about every website out there wants you to create an account even though it's functionally unnecessary?
And I'd like to point out that just think what Google would have done if Google Glass took off.
This "Don't do Evil" lasts only long enough for their revenues to grow. When a business' revenues stagnate, they MUST do things to increase it and when the major holders' interests stagnate, they change their tune. They all become hypocrites in the end.
And remember, Google is an advertising company and their game is to target the ads - that's why folks pay through the nose for it. And to target those adds, they must collect YOUR information.
While I suppose this is an argument for submitting anonymous content, I only run the risk of being hung for my own posting foolishness, while you could easily be mistaken for another coward.
Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.
Ernest Hemingway
The big issue here is that folks with gmail accounts that predate this were under the assumptions about how the data is being used and now they have to either accept the new terms or go through the incredible hassle of changing addresses.
This is a massive expansion of what they had been doing and there needs to be some sort of legal action taken against them as this isn't something that people have a reasonable option of opting out of. Between Google's products and the ones they bought when they were allowed to illegally purchase Doubleclick, there's very little chance of people actually avoiding being in these databases and very little choice once you're in there of getting out. The only choices you have require you to already have an account.
Throw Google under the bus not the poor folks just trying to feed their families.
"Poor folks just trying to feed their families"? These are well paid engineers with options. Anyone talented enough to get a job at Google is talented enough to secure employment elsewhere. They are willing accomplices to this action and pretending otherwise is disingenuous. Evidently these engineers lack a moral compass and their word means nothing. If they had a problem with this action they could easily have spoken up and taken action but they took the easy path and did nothing.
Pretty sure you'd scream bloody murder if you employer's actions were layer at your feet - douche!
My employer's actions are routinely laid at my feet and rightfully so. I am responsible for my actions at my employer as well as those who work for me. Companies are comprised of people who commit these actions and when these actions injure others there should be some accountability. If I have an ethical problem with what management at my company is doing or if I was wrongly accused of something I was not responsible for you can be quite certain I would either leave or take appropriate action to defend myself. But if I'm quiet about something then effectively I am endorsing it.