How much data is Google truly collecting? Or is what people saying a tad bit of a exaggeration? Because people say that Google DOES know everything about most people no matter the percautions or measures. And I’m just wondering, who would Google even sell this to, how does Google even get it in the first place? And is it possible to remove some of those details? Because I was looking at Google subpoena’s and saw they have… quite alot. But is there more than that?
They gather stuff across all their services like Search, YouTube, Maps, Gmail + millions of third-party websites through embedded tracking code (like Analytics and AdSense) so you’re basically tracked everywhere you go even if you never use Google directly. Passive tracking continues even when signed out because your browser and device IDs still get tagged, meaning they keep building profiles on you without needing login credentials. You can delete some stuff but it doesn’t stop everything, like the data already auctioned off to advertisers is gone forever and there’s no undo button for that.
Google mostly doesn’t sell your data, they sell access to you. Advertisers pay to reach the profile, the data stays in-house. They collect it not just from search/Maps/Android but from Analytics, reCAPTCHA, and “Sign in with Google” scattered across most of the web, so you feed them off-Google too. “They know everything” is a bit exaggerated, but precautions (no sign-in, uBlock, non-Chrome browser, de-Googled phone) genuinely shrink it. You can delete history at myactivity.google.com, but that trims what’s retained, it doesn’t stop future collection.
Same reason the subpoena stuff matters: data that exists can be subpoenaed or breached. The only safe data is what was never collected
I have actually been wondering about this. I closed my gmail account about 15 years ago, I don’t use a google account, watch YouTube via front ends with a VPN, don’t use Chrome-based browsers, and have unlock Origin set to strict mode blocking most trackers. Given this, what does Google get about me? I can think of emails sent to people who use Gmail and captchas, but that last one should not give much data, especially when the account credentials do not include my name or email. Anything else to account for?
Even though Google doesn’t sell your PII and doesn’t offer lookups from PII, they seem to share your interests with other tech companies. For example, some people have noticed that their search results on Amazon or their Reddit homepage feature topics of websites they’ve been browsing or YouTube videos they have watched.
It is commonly assumed that companies like Amazon and Google keep their data strictly siloed, but that assumption may no longer hold.