philip lelyveld The world of entertainment technology

Google’s data collection is hard to escape, study claims

Short of chucking your phone into the river, shunning the internet, and learning to read paper maps again, there's not much you can do to keep Google from collecting data about you.

So says a Vanderbilt University computer scientist who led an analysis of Google's data collection practices. His report, released Tuesday, outlines a myriad ways the company amasses information about the billions of people who use the world's leading search engine, web browser, and mobile operating system, not to mention products like Gmail, platforms like YouTube, and products like Nest.

Although the report doesn't contain any bombshells, it presents an overview of Google's efforts to learn as much as possible about people.

The researchers claims that almost every move you make online is collected and collated, from your morning routine (such as music tastes, route to work, and news preferences) to errands (including calendar appointments, webpages visited, and purchases made).

"At the end of the day, Google identified user interests with remarkable accuracy," the report states.

But it also uses much of the information to more effectively deliver ads, which accounted for 86% of Google's revenue in the second quarter of this year.

Google's own settings don't necessarily stop collection. A recent investigation by the Associated Press found that the company continued to record location data even after a user disables the Location History option. Google said the data is used to improve services, but has updated the wording of the setting to make it clear that location information is still collected.

See the full story here: https://money.cnn.com/2018/08/21/technology/google-data-collection/