Google enables advertisers a look into your browsing history…
It’s disgusting. Users browser history is private, just like their search history. Fuck Google.
Exactly. If Google wants to collect user data and use it for their products, they should be paying users. You can’t build and sell cars without paying for the nuts and bolts, yet Google has been taking their materials for free.
Not for free, for a browser. This doesn’t make it any less evil.
That’s not the deal though. It’s not an exchange of data for the use of the product, like you would exchange money for a product or service. The product is offered free of charge, and alongside that they collect whatever they can get away with. There’s no consideration, there’s no proportionality, it doesn’t meet the basic tenets of contract law.
Data companies thrive in this hazy grey zone where regulations haven’t been made. However, when you compare what they do to anything else, it’s clearly unreasonable. If I invite you into my home, that doesn’t mean I give you permission to take the strawberries from my garden. If you invite me into your home, that doesn’t mean you get permission to go through my wallet and take photos of everything inside.
It’s getting worse, look at Microsoft now. You pay them for the software and they still take your data.
Data needs to be regulated, such that users are fairly compensated and more properly in control of it. Either that, or it must be completely open - Google can collect the data, but their raw database must be freely available to everyone. Lobbying has proven effective for Google et al, however there is some small hope because law makers themselves are also the victims - everyone is. They just need to realise the true value of what’s being taken from them.
No disagreement here. It’s just unfortunate that the users happily agree to everything you’ve pointed out. Because their browser is apparently just so nice, and a typical user has no ability to recognize value in their data so it feels free to them.
The problem is that the users truly don’t understand how terrifying the data is.
End, it seems impossible to educate them on it .
Nobody wants to believe that they can be manipulated as easily as they actually can be, especially with a bunch of inside information that you don’t think is relevant.
Everyone wants to believe that they are freethinkers and make decisions themselves without “Google bias” and subtle manipulation.
I honestly have no idea how to fight that and it terrifies me
I don’t necessarily disagree, but your analogy of inviting someone into your home is flawed. You did agree to them collecting some anonymous data just by using it, and the browser history usage is opt-in.
Their products are not free, they just don’t cost money. If you don’t agree with that policy, don’t use their products. I would also add that this is their business model for most of their products (which are undeniably extremely popular, because they’re good).
Maps, Search, Chrome, YouTube, etc are all really good products that you pay for by letting them use some of your data, but not the more sensitive parts, in my opinion.
I disagree that their “raw database” should be public. That seems like a terrible idea. I would much rather share my clicks and geolocation than pay for the service (I don’t, but I would prefer that model).
I do however agree that data needs to be regulated, and that users solely own all their own data.
No amount of regulation would help if the users themselves don’t value their data. As far as they are concerned, these products are free. They might be wrong, but that’s irrelevant here, the relevant part is that to them their data is worthless so they don’t care. We need more education on this, not regulation. Or rather we need both.
Yes, and people are free to choose and think what they want. Everyone knows there can be shady things in ToS, they just don’t care, and that’s honestly fine.
A more serious issue, in my opinion, is sensitive personal data like government identification, medical and banking records, and of course date of birth, address, etc. that can be used to identify you and in worse cases, steal your identity.
Such data is not being handled well enough, for the vast majority of cases. I’m lucky to live in a country/region that does it well (better than most), with laws protecting individuals.
But honestly idgaf if ad trackers can see on my digital footprint that I just bought a bicycle. I also enjoy services like Google Maps very much, because it works scarily well, and I can choose when I want to be tracked or not.
Problem is, Chrome abused a notion that was set up by mozilla - the idea of software without strings, open source, freely available to all. That was the environment that Chrome first set foot in, and they absolutely took advantage of that preconception, same as fb.
People forget that before google started getting cunty ‘if you don’t pay for the product you are the product’ really wasn’t a thing on the 'net.
They conceived of and created predatory practises most users literally had no framework to conceive of - the onus is on them for that shit.
Oh yeah no problem, just be alive in 2023 and don’t use any Google products. Totally an easy choice! /s
Yes, it very much is.
It actually really, really isn’t. Just try blocking Google services using an ad blocker and see how many websites don’t work. How Google track who you bank with, where you have social media accounts and basically everything they can with Captcha. If you don’t connect to google.com, gstatic.com and maybe fonts.google.com then so much stuff online simply does not work.
I think you mean “tenets of contract law”, rather than tenants. Not trying to be “that” guy, I had to look it up myself.
Nice one.
A few posts up, there’s an article about how basically all cars manufacturers are a privacy nightmare
It seems to me that we need some software that intercepts the data being sent to Google, replaces all proper nouns with “Sundar Pichai,” all numbers with a 10 followed by 100 zeroes, and randomizes everything else before sending. The data they receive would look like it was smuggled out of a Being John Malkovich parallel universe.
Or we could just use Firefox. Or Lynx.
It’s opt-in and they’re very clear about that.
This is completely incorrect. It is opt-out.
It was turned on for me by default when I opened Chrome (it had updated in the background). I had to go to settings to turn it back off.
I live in Europe, and it’s most definitely opt-in.
For now
No… Even if that was true, what you’re saying is “you’re right, but you might not be in a month, sooo Google bad”.
It won’t be opt-out because first of all, that’s against the law. And second you’re literally opting in by accepting their terms…
I’m glad you live in the EU because it’s opt-out for everyone else.
I’m glad too
“Enhanced Ad Privacy.” That’s the technology that, unless switched off, allows websites to target the user with adverts tuned to their online activities
That’s some Orwellian shit right there.
This is how the internet has worked since forever. At least for Chrome it’s opt-in, and they’re very clear about what is shared.
Edit: apparently it’s only opt-in in Europe so I offer my condolences
It’s not opt-in. These settings are automatically set to be turned on unless you intentionally turn them off. So they’re opt-out by definition.
On android i got asked if i wanna turn it on upon opening chrome, but since they call it “ad privacy” I can see a lot of people thinking it’s a good thing when in reality it just makes it easier for ads to track you without needing your cookie consent. I do remember though on windows it was a “Hey it’s on now, go to the settings to turn it back off” kind of message
That latter message is exactly what I got on Chrome on my work computer. It said something akin to “Ad privacy is turned on. Go here to edit the settings!” and then you go look and they’re all set to be enabled. I had to turn them all off.
It is most definitely opt-in for me. It popped up and said “would you like to enable this?”, explaining what would be shared and why. It was not enabled automatically. That’s opt-in if you ask me.
I’ve been getting it on and off for a couple of weeks and that’s my experience too… you get a ‘we want to enable this exciting new feature’ and you click no. They’ll ask again… which may push me to use firefox more.
I got the pop-up on desktop chrome yesterday and I had to intentionally go to the settings and turn them off.
Maybe it’s different on mobile chrome? I don’t know but it was absolutely opt-out on desktop.
I use Firefox as my main browser but work requires I use chrome for some stupid bullshit. Otherwise I wouldn’t touch the browser at all.
So your region does not have laws prevent them from automatically enabling it.
I think they are confusing the terms opt-in and opt-out. It is opt-out with a pop up that notifies you to review the changes.
No… It pops up and asks you very clearly if you want to enable it. It also shows what it is, what’s being tracked, and who the information is shared with.
I’ll have to take a look later but I specifically remember the options being auto selected. So you have to go to the options and uncheck them when that pop up comes up. That would be saying the default option would be for it to be on. So you would have to opt out of the changes. Opt in would be default option set to off.
Were you on a computer, or a phone. Also are you in Europe? I have seen some users say that in the U.S. it is checked by default (where I am at) and some users in Europe claim it is unchecked by default there.
I doubt this “opt-in” would replace the already existing tracking. It being opt-in is pointless since at very best it doesn’t change anything.
It’s opt-out. It’s on by default in Chrome as they claim it is the safest option, and you have to turn it off so it stops sending some data to Google. I think only in Europe it’s opt-in, because only Europe enforces their citizens rights to not have their privacy raped by US companies in the name of security.
I live in Europe so maybe that’s why it asked me if I wanted to enable it.
That’s how bad online services and nonfree programs was working since forever. The Internet is just sending the stuff your computer want to send.
Tracking cookies have been a thing for literally decades.
I’ve never left Firefox. Through their redesigns and restructure of available add-ons, Firefox has always been the better option because they’ve always been focused on user options and user privacy.
"I don’t want my browser keeping track of my browsing history to help serve me ads, and I definitely don’t want my browser sharing any function of my browsing history with every random website I visit.”
Then why were you using Chrome in the first place?? This feels very much like “‘I never thought the leopards would eat my face,’ says the head of the Leopards Eating People’s Faces Party.”
Every single product offered by Google is meant as an ad delivery method to increase their balance sheet. I’m honestly shocked by the people who are shocked when Google takes steps that are meant to increase ad delivery when that’s always been Google’s ultimate goal.
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Firefox is the superior browser to all of these by far
Firefox + uBlock Origin is a godsend. Shout outs also go to DuckDuckGo and the Privacy Badger add-on
Fwiw, my experience with Firefox has been so good that I’ve started using Pocket and Thunderbird as well (both also developed by Mozilla). There’s a bit of a learning curve, but resources are easily found online, and the privacy and customization benefits easily outweigh the hiccups, imo
If you’re frustrated with Firefox you could give Brave Browser a try. The devs forked off of Chromium and removed all of the tracking that Google wants in there. It comes pre-loaded with all of the Ad-blocking features I use in Firefox as well, so no extensions needed for that. Also you’ll still be able to use the Chromecast feature if you really want to go in and re-enable it.
The only thing you’ll want to do is to switch the Homepage off and probably disable the icon at the top for enrolling in their ad rewards program (which handles the problems that a lot of users here have with Brave).
Why not just use Firefox (while you still can …)
I’ll ready raw html before I use Chrome.
You’ll read html sure, but will you read CSS? shudders
I’m training to mentally compile javascript now. Kinda stumped on how to access backend data stores though.
Gotta have that V8 JS Engine in your head
Why, will you soon not be able to?
I think they’re just referring to FF’s small market share.
Firefox’s user base is apparently been dwindling for a long time now, so the possibility of this browser shutting down due to not having enough funds is getting higher and higher each year. At least, that’s how I interpret it.
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Can’t donate to them considering how much money is wasted on their shit ceo.
Even then, I’m sure there’s a litany of other things that they think they need but they don’t. I notice the bigger corporations become, the more justified they feel in wasting resources.
This was overwhelming rejected by everyone, including Microsoft, Mozilla, Safari, and others. It’s universally disliked, and Google knows this, but they intentionally know they’re abusing their monopoly to push anti-consumer bullshit.
It sure would be nice if the US still pretended to care about consumers and breaking up monopolies.
I was born way after that may have ever happened, so sounds more like a fairy tale to me
The solution to breaking up monopolies is nationalization.
All of a sudden, we’re paying less money and have way more rights. It’s why the USPS can’t open your mail without probably cause but fedex and ups can.
Rich people and their dick-suckers will be upset. But who cares about them anyways?
I opened the browser at the library to print a pre employment drug screen form today. The browser had a pop up asking to review settings, it looked like you could tell them not to use ads this way, but damn I wish I would have read it now. Not my computer and it reboots to clear the profile when you “log out” so I didnt spend the time
“don’t be evil” days have been over since forever ago.
don’t be evil
Any organization that feels the need to outright claim without being asked that they’re not evil are 100% projecting and are evil.
I think they honestly weren’t, back in those days, or at least trying not to be.
Now google is a fully fledged advertising and marketing company
I already dumped google search in favor of DuckDuckGo years ago which gives objectively better results. Google search has been overrun with SEO spam since years ago
I’m getting rid of chrome, then of google drive, then what more… Google maps is a big one to drop too but it’s so nice.
It sucks that a company builds good software and then just abuses the crap out of it but this is why we have open source!
Lastly I’ll need to drop google from my Android phone, somehow.
So you’re telling me that Bing provides better search results than Google?
Ik using DuckDuckGo. I do believe they’re using some bing tech, but the results are definitely better than google for me. Whenever I go back to try it again, google gives me only spammy SEO optimized results that are useless
Ever try startpage.com?
I no longer would trust Startpage much as I used to. When System1 got into it, I backed off.
Even worse, the act of removing that from their motto.
“Fuck it everyone already knows we’re evil no point in pretending now.” – Google, probably
Nah. In the early days it made sense because Google was doing some really cool things.
2056
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Plug DNA access into pc
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Google sync my brain chip with my browser page
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Start searching new brain plague of 2043
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Google show ad pop-up in my eyes, try to close them, but the ads are projected on the optic nerve.
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New ideia
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scan anti-ad chip that my friend gave me
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It works, I’m free
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anyway, try to order food
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Error the system is not autenticated please install chrome chiplinx 3.8 to continue.
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Receive fine of half my salary, new policy under anti-piracy order
Please drink verification can
Don’t forget to scream “I fucking love Amazon!” clearly into the microphone.
Black mirror comming true!
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That’s fine. I’ll continue to use Firefox.
It’s crazy to think that this level of intrusion is considered fair game. The way these behaviors are normalized is completely dystopian.
It’s absolutely insane that this is legal. This type of spying is explicitly forbidden in the constitution of the United States of America, but since it’s a private corporation it’s suddenly okay? The FBI has been known to purchase information about consumers from private corporations. This is a back door around the 4th amendment. Actually since corporations are essentially governing by proxy, buying laws and legislatures, this is a constitutional violation.
Incremental changes have muffled the impact to most consumers sadly and as long as that works they’ll keep doing it.
They already did this with Youtube. I turned of Youtube history because I didn’t want anyone being able to track what I watch. All of a sudden, Youtube’s home page for my account was blank with a message that said “Turn on history if you want to see recommendations”. I sat with that for a couple days, going to Youtube to check out channels I’d subscribed to. It wasn’t the same. When I got to Youtube for some distraction, I want to discover something different from my usual stuff. So I delete my history weekly as part of “routine maintainence”.
Same I delete all my history in clean state on youtube. I hate seeng videos thay I’ve already watched before.
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Exactly! Erasing your history just means YOU can’t see it anymore.
Youtube let the other shoe drop in their end-stage enshittification this week. Last month, they required you to turn on Youtube History to view the feed of youtube videos recommendations. That seems reasonable, so I did it. But I delete my history every 1 week instead of every 3 months. So they don’t get much from my choices. It still did a pretty good job of showing me stuff I was interested in watching.
Then on Oct 1, they threw up a “You’re using an Ad Blocker” overlay on videos. I’d use my trusty Overlay Remover plugin to remove the annoying javascript graphic and watch what I wanted. I didn’t have to click the X to dismiss the obnoxious page.
Last week, they started placing a timer with the X so you had to wait 5 seconds for the X to appear so you could dismiss blocking graphic.
Today, there was a new graphic. It allowed you to view three videos before you had to turn off your Ad Blocker. I viewed a video 3 times just to see what happens.
Now all I see is this: “Ad Blockers violate Youtube’s Terms of Service”
Google has out and out made it a violation of their ToS to have an ad blocker to view Youtube. Or you can pay them $$$.
I ban such sites from my systems by replacing their DNS name in my hosts file routed to 127.0.0.1 which means I can’t view the site. I have quite a few banned sites now.
That deletion strategy is useless. They can still retain that information indefinitely.
Just use the search bar.
I assumed this was happening for years
I think it’s a new thing where the browser does the profiling locally, and supposedly without allowing sites to track you anymore. But of course the sites can still ask the browser for your personal interests in order to serve you ads, so I couldn’t tell you why they think this is any better.
It would no longer be minable from a central server. That’s measurably better.
You can also quickly delete it yourself. That’s better
Bottom line, your browser should not be part of the ad network.
I’m explaining why it’s “better” , not agreeing or disagreeing with it.
Ultimately I don’t give a fuck because I haven’t trusted Google in a long time and I never left Firefox.
Mozilla ftw.
Who tf used Chrome for years!?
(checks notes)
Oh, the majority :|
Well that’s the thing, Google needed something to test with before they started doing this.
I thought this is the way it’s been since 2008.
So glad I moved to Firefox, fu Google
Mobile has extensions too. Ublock on Firefox mobile is a god send.
I tried Firefox in like 2016 but it was very slow for some reason.
Is it fast now? Been thinking about securing my privacy lately so I might give it another try.Im going for as much privacy I can while still maintaining as much functionality as possible.
Anyone having any pointers?Ive used Firefox and chrome for a long time side by side and on a daily use basis there is not any discernable difference that’s caused by the browser. On Firefox, add the extensions ublock origin, privacy badger, and decrentraleyes to start with, and I’d recommend changing default search to duckduckgo or start page as well. Your entire web experience will be massively improved (Yes ddg and start page look and feel different. Search results are the same but without all the ads and misdirects)
Bro, 2016 in browser terms is ancient history.
Imagine saying in 2003: “I tried such-and-such in 1996. Is it fast now?”
I think I’ll just invite Google to come get my dna, set up cameras everywhere, and install a microchip in my brain. Then I can be done with this slow-walk of privacy invasion.
I got the Google Suppository Health Monitor, I just stick it in my butt and nano bots flood my body looking for things to advertise to me about.
Yet the simps still won’t use Firefox
I feel like people in general give google too big of a pass all the time. I feel like I read apple hate every second while people somehow distinguish android from google.
Ikr? Google openly became the cartoonishly evil overlord, so much so it basically entered pop culture as such (Meta, Apple, MS, Amazon, etc also all the same).
And installing either Firefox or Chrome is exactly the same for the user, usage too. But no, let the poor megacorp have some more data so they can sell us some more direct ads and even more indirect ads that aren’t even labeled as such (yet Alphabet profits from that) … and become even more powerful influencing everyones lives, legislation, etc
I hated being the go-to guy for tech support in my family, but at least I get to jam open sauce things everywhere. They are never happy with any changes, but after a few days nobody remembers Microsoft & co, so everyone is really happy with things like Linux, Firefox (mobile too!), LibreOffice, Thunderbird, Signal, FairEmail & other open android apps, etc
Every bit helps. Nicely done friend!
But they have a great excuse tho! Something about vertical tabs! Fuck privacy when vertical tabs are at stake!!
Vertical tabs are an ABOMINATION!
Well that’s what to expect from a web browser created by an advertising company.
That’s what people don’t understand. Google’s actual customers are advertisers, just like with broadcast television. The deal you make with Google is that they’ll give you all sorts of “free” services and software, and in return, you’ll see ads.
And there’s nothing inherently wrong with that model. You get what you want, Google gets what they want, and advertisers pay for it all in the hopes that you’ll like whatever they’re selling and buy it.
You can always stop using free services and pay for them directly instead, cutting the advertisers out. Or use free services from non-profits and open-source software.
But the problem is that it’s also in Google’s best interests to make that as difficult as possible. To make avoiding their data-consumption damn near impossible. Collecting, comparing, collating, and indexing data is literally what they’re the best in the world at. And they have their methods of getting it everywhere.
A broadcaster can’t stop you from turning off the TV or muting it during ads. If they could, they certainly would. (Thanks, laissez-faire capitalism!) But they’re not serving the ads AND providing the TV itself.
Google is both the broadcaster and the TV manufacturer in this analogy. They’re saying, “Here’s a free TV. Isn’t it nice? And it’ll help us give you extremely targeted and personalized ads. Hope you don’t mind that we’ve made it hard to mute, and the TV never actually turns all the way off. And sure, it’s got a camera and microphone, but what did you expect? It’s free!”
How about not using Chrome? Firefox Gang!
I am the only person out of my friends group who doesn’t use chrome. One of my friends even fully understands the issues with chrome and still won’t stop using it!
I can’t understand this there’s got to be some kind of psychological phenomenon happening here I’m completely unaware of.
I feel like they have some sort of unwarranted loyalty to chrome…
At a personal level I use waterfox I just like the way it looks.
I never really understood the appeal all that much to begin with. I mostly stuck with FF.
There was a brief period of time when chrome launched it seemed faster to me. I also liked the way it had a clean ui compared to others at the time. Used it for years, and it just got worse and worse.
I switched to Firefox a few years ago and it’s much better imo. But I remember feeling like chrome was really good for a little while.
It’s inertia, at least in my own experience. I’ve had a bunch of things I’ve been meaning to do but was lazy and stuck in my habits until some new event made me say “enough is enough” and then I try the new thing and a lot of the time I end up thinking I should have just done that sooner. But before that, it’s “I know there’s problems with this but it’s what I know”.
Doing the jump to Linux is the current one I’m procrastinating on. I use it already, just not on my main machine, so it’s not even like I don’t know how it is. I’ve just had a Windows main machine all my life and installing a new OS is a pain. But I do want to feel amusement instead of annoyance when hearing about the latest BS MS is trying to push.
Ya. I feel you on Linux. My media center PC is Linux and it works perfectly.
The issue for my main rig is that the main games I play don’t support it. Which sucks.
Have you tried LibreWolf? It’s a far superior fork of Firefox with many built-in privacy features and pre-installed uBlock Origin.
I have not! But I will definitely give it a looksee
