Give in to Google?

I'm one of those guys who's NOT on the social networks, who NEVER logins with Google account (or any other common denominator account) on unrelated websites, who doesn't use any of the Google stuff on smartphone - even GAPPS, with VPN running at all times, NoScript and the usual pack of antis-spying extensions in Firefox, Win10 with no MS account and spyware removed by OOSU and other tricks, etc - you get the picture. I just find the idea that somebody may pry into my personal life without my explicit agreement EXTREMELY OFFENSIVE.

Moreover that, I believe organizations focused on collecting user data for sale do not care much about its security and possible misuse by third parties - which may happen if not now, then later. E.g. maybe I'll pursuit political career, or become famous otherwise - and some asshole will be blackmailing me with decades old search history where I was looking up how to evade taxes or pirated scientific publication which is protected by extremely high paywall. Or worse, go to jail in totalitarian state for writing something which falls under constantly expanding bloody long list of things the paranoid ruling party doesn't like.

Recently, however, I have grown tired of using the alternatives. Results of DuckDuckGo are sometimes utter ****, I have to use it with !g flag too much. Osmand navigation is incapable of correcting typos, which is often the case with smartphone and annoys the hell out of me. I would like to use a voice assistant on my new smartphone, and offline Saiy seems lacking. And I can't live without YouTube anyway (though I only watch it in appropriately secured Firefox).

Maybe there are better options for described tasks which still do not spy on end users, and will resolve my issues?

Or maybe properly setup Google account is good enough and doesn't require sacrificing privacy and security nowadays, and I should embrace their solutions?

Honestly, I don't know. Let's discuss!

@Dr. AMK @hmscott @Phoenix @Vasudev

 

Hmmm, I didn't see the alert @hmscott should have generated...but I did see 2 alerts from you from another thread, thanks for the +rep.

I'd suggest continuing as you have been, and explore proxies and interfaces that gather results from places that normally require logins without creating accounts and logging in yourself.

They've made it hard to avoid giving out private info constantly, and made it hard to stay away, but stay strong - maybe someday people will get paid for their private info and your's will be worth top dollar - as it's uncommonly unavailable.

 

Usually you are just an anonymous number in terms of sold data. You can clear your entire history and reset advertising ID as well. I’d be more worried about Facebook that was tracking people even without a Facebook account and you had to create an account to delete it.

Credit card/debit card purchases (foods, gym membership etc) and other activity can be used to build an activity profile for insurance companies (identifying you directly at times) so yeah..this is outside of the internet. Also apparently data collected by companies like Fitbit, Apple, other health apps etc on those activity trackers are not covered by HIPAA either.

Having said that, more power to you man/woman. I tried going without Google but I’m hooked onto my personalized search results!

Grr, I’m trying to find that article again..
https://www.benefitspro.com/2018/07...d-to-create-health-p/?slreturn=20180701185728

 

For me it's a question of productivity vs potential backfire from this decision, to be honest.

I have Noscript, Privacy Badger and uBlock Origin to counter Google/Fb/Twitter/other uninvited tracking. Don't have a FB or any other social network account but I guess I'll have to get one for Tinder&Bumble cause I feel I'm missing out.

For local goods and services, I pay by cash for all stuff except mobile / home internet. These guys got my ID data anyway, according to local laws. I get paid in cash for a lot of what I do, so it comes natural; also, I never used a credit card or took a loan from bank for anything in my life - again, unrelated to privacy concerns, just never needed it.

I actually use a Google account for a part-time job exclusively since it requires it, with full anti-privacy setttings, in separate browser bypassing VPN - so it does not correspond with personal stuff not related to this gig. I had a personalized Google account until deleting it some years ago however, and am pretty familiar with how Google search works and why it asks for so much data - but the things is, in my opinion it still works like crap, be it personalized or not; still better than alternatives, though. I would definitely prefer something more verbatim, without losing the option to sort results by date - while Google offers either or.

 

@Starlight5 Actually you can't avoid 100% telemetry at all even if you're an expert hacker.
Anyway these companies pull the telemetry data then clean it by removing unnecessary details otherwise they'll be wasting huge amount of cloud server spaces.
I signed into W10 using MSA and also use Google mail to sign into the phones as well. I thought Apple was better in keeping privacy but the truth is even they don't care about it. Hell, I can deduce where an iphone user went just by looking at its location data since Apple by default hides location icon. Even their telemetry can be easily targeted since iphones are having uniqueID.
So, wherever you go telemetry is your step brother in every step you take!

 

Is there some quality article about what Google collects from mobile users who didn't sign in with Google account yet still use their apps & services? E.g. Maps on Android work without signing in.

 

Might as well. You already gave up so much by using a smartphone.

I'm like you, but I go the extra step by never giving in to a smartphone. If you can't avoid it, fake it.

 

I adopted smartphones pretty late, and my first device was Nokia N900 running Maemo Debian-derived Linux distribution which didn't spy on me. So sad the hardware was barely adequate even when I got it, with all the tricks (custom kernel, 1.5x overclocking combined with some undervolting, etc); it was even better than LineageOS in terms of privacy, cause everything just worked without any annoying telemetry and all.

 

Still have my Nokia Asha 305 running in Mint condition besides cosmetic defects on rear panel. Still holding to my Lumia and trying out LineageOS on core prime(with everything Google enabled).

 

From last year, "Android phones gather your location data and send it to Google, even if you’ve turned off location services and don’t have a SIM card"

It's when things like that emerge one really starts wondering about the state of affairs.

https://www.theverge.com/2017/11/21...g-cell-tower-data-android-os-firebase-privacy

 

Google's data collection is hard to escape, study claims
by Heather Kelly @heatherkelly, August 21, 2018: 12:26 AM ET
https://money.cnn.com/2018/08/21/technology/google-data-collection/index.html

3:52 - Google's data collection is hard to escape, study claims

 

Well with MasterCard they can now track offline purchases and correlate them to online ads.

https://www.phonearena.com/news/google-mastercard-deal-track-online-ads-offline-purchases_id108345

I’m still not paranoid enough to stop using their search though as nothing comes close to it in my experience from general use all the way to my research related searches. If it was Bing I’d stop immediately though . There is no escaping offline tracking however from things ranging from in store purchases to insurance information. Best Buy for example uses a third party company that tracks exchanges/returns across multiple brands of stores, guess they can create like a blacklist. Best Buy has a yearly returns limit after sometimes 3 I believe you get a warning that it’s the last for the year, that info also goes to their contracted company that handles exchanges so other non-Best Buy stores would also know. Some of it I guess makes sense as excessive returners help raise prices as the products thenget marked down. I still use Best Buy more than Amazon for large electronics as it’s much cheaper (ie TVs etc) and with extended warranty I can just walk into a store if anything goes wrong, even laptops like my Dell 7567 were cheaper from Dell and Best Buy than Amazon. Honestly I think even Amazon started banning people for excessive returns though their threshold is probably much higher, but I’m not sure they share that data to third parties or not.

 

Is everyone that freaking paranoid? Really who really gives. If you do not get charged for any services, and not getting impacted personally. Really. Who cares.

 

No but I don’t think you read the whole thread.... I personally use Google services a lot myself. However when things go too far and some entities use data like activity profiles from smart trackers (Not covered by HIPAA) and purchases to build a health profile for insurance companies then it makes a difference..... or when you disable tracking and are still tracked or situations when you have to create an account on certain sites to delete data that was collected when you weren’t a user. There’s more to tracking than just for ads/improving maps which is more benign. You don’t have to be paranoid but you should be aware, if you are ignorant you can get taken advantage of. Most of us are just discussing what’s going on, nothing wrong or paranoid about that.

 

I am not ignorant. I just stated that unless its a monetary "grab" from my account by apple, google, MS or whatever. YEP I would be there demanding action. But just tracking where I go, etc I do not care. If you have to create an account for a site you were not a user for just to do something it's YOU who are the issue...not google, apple or ms...etc.

 

EU thinks otherwise, as do plenty of others here in the States where there’s quite a few pending lawsuits and other places too, as well, in regards to things like tracking non-users and having to create accounts to delete data when you weren’t even a user in the first place ie Facebook.

You may not care what’s collected that’s fine, others do. But I wouldn’t say who cares... plenty do. Different people have different thresholds. What right do you or I have to tell people how much privacy they deserve.

I don’t mind ads tracking or Mapping data collections for product improvement but others do and it’s their right to deny that data especially when they turn the setting to off they expect it to not collect data... Google has admitted that will now reword information to say they will still collect dome data regardless for mapping which is more honest vs the previous wording which was deceptive.

I did not call you ignorant nor was I insulting you, I said if we are ignorant we are just asking to get taken advantage of. It was diligence from other people/institutions/media coverage which scrutinized them which made Google change some of its practices some of which was even pretty deceptive in regards to privacy same with Facebook....

 

That is interesting dilemma actually. you can't just go and tell company X to delete all data related to person Y. The request has to come from the user itself and user needs to be properly identified, which practically is easiest by making an account to the service. I guess it could be done by sending photocopies of documents by snail mail too...

Because related to the identifying part I overheard something less funny today. A customer XX had their internet connection terminated today. A call to the ISP and they said someone named "jack smith" ordered it couple days earlier and to be executed today. Well, there is no-one named that in customer's organisation nor in ours... So, in my opinion it should not be possible to blindly delete someones data, if someone just asks to do it... even if it would be easy.

 

I personally use YouTube all the time, and Google Search often (via DuckDuckGo !g flag, but I guess I'll switch to !sp soon). I don't tolerate ads, and every device I use has all sorts of ad-blockers to prevent them from ever appearing on my screen.

If a company has enough money for advertising, their prices are way too high and there's some other company offering the very same goods and/or services with same or better quality without spending much, if anything at all, on advertising - and I'll definitely choose the latter.

 

https://adnauseam.io/
I'm using this in my Chrome browser now. I like the idea, where advertiser pays money and site manager gets it but I still don't have to see ads

 

Hmmm, AdNauseam was banned from the Chrome App store quite a while ago:

Google nukes ad-blocker AdNauseam, sweeps remains out of Chrome Web Store
Web advertising giant declares plugin is malware
By Thomas Claburn in San Francisco 5 Jan 2017 at 22:34
https://www.theregister.co.uk/2017/01/05/adnauseam_expelled_from_chrome_web_store/

AdNauseam's site claims the ban "failed", but their app still isn't on the Chrome App store right now...
https://adnauseam.io/free-adnauseam.html

Using the installer icon on the top level of their site, it redirects here:

Install AdNauseam on Chrome Without Google's Permission
Daniel Howe edited this page Jul 28, 2018 · 51 revisions
https://github.com/dhowe/AdNauseam/wiki/Install-AdNauseam-on-Chrome-Without-Google's-Permission

 

I know. It kind of screws their behaviour tracking, when they just see user cliking EVERY ad it sees
I installed it manually.

 

I see how now, but still wonder why I would want to do this when I already run ublock Origin, which is the base for the AdNauseam.

What is the advantage to the user of this?

I haven't finished the FAQ, but it concerns me that my source address is being registered as clicking the ad's.

Blocking ad's is ok by me, I prefer not downloading the ad and hiding it, I don't want the bandwidth on my internet and computer used at all by the unwanted data. Hiding the ad - text or image - after downloading it doesn't make sense to me.

I understand the downloading is to "trick" the advertiser into paying the site, but that's not cool by me either. I don't want to be ripped off, which is why I block the ad's, so I don't want to turn around and "rip them off" by faking looking at their ad's.

It's an interesting idea, but I don't think it's for me.

I'll keep reading.

 

Websites usually run ads because it creates them revenue to pay running costs of said site.
With ad nauseaum, I don't see the ads but the addon clicks them and website gets some money from the advertiser.
Pretty much more actually, because I don't really click any ads since they don't interest me.

 

I understand the downloading is to "trick" the advertiser into paying the site, but that's not cool by me either. I don't want to be ripped off, which is why I block the potential malware / adware / ad's, but I don't want to turn around and "rip them off" by faking looking at their ad's.

It's an interesting idea, but I don't think it's for me.

 

Google is tracking you. Even when you're in Airplane Mode
Victorio Novikos
Published on Feb 10, 2018
Google is tracking you. Even when you're in Airplane Mode. It knows when you get out the car. When you're walking. We now have proof.

Google has been secretly tracking people against their wishes.

The company has been collecting Android users’ location data, even when they’ve actively disabled location services.

It’s an extremely concerning discovery, which means that Google can pinpoint exactly where you are even when you go out of your way to hide this information.


This is how Google is spying on everything you do
The Hated One
Published on Oct 6, 2018
Google is spying on everything you. Literally everything. If you are not protecting yourself, Google is after your personal life whether you like it or it. Google spies on you and it's not just a conspiracy theory anymore.

Google’s presence is literally everywhere and it wants to play god without permission. Google’s surveillance has no limits. They track literally everything you do and everywhere you go. And not just on the Internet, but even in real life. This how Google manages to follow your every step.

Google servers are tapped by intelligence agencies in the US and other Five eyes countries, which include UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. The US National Security Agency then keeps a copy of your search history tied back to your phone number forever in their data centres.

Google really wants to know where you go. So much so that it keeps tracking your location even if you tell it not to. Google achieved dominance in digital advertising thanks to their focus, commitment and sheer will. The will to know about every single step you make. Google is able to attract advertisers thanks to their ability to profile records of your entire activity on the web. But this time, the corporate behemoth is able to track what you buy even in physical stores. Google spying has no limits. The laws are ancient and broken because Google lobbies millions of dollars every year to keep privacy regulations at check.


Google Has Been Recording Your Voice
Unbox Therapy
Published on Jun 3, 2016
Head over to https://history.google.com/history/audio to check for recorded clips from your device (must be logged into Google account). This recording function exists to help Google understand your language better in the future for voice search etc. The problem arises from "hot words" that launch the voice function and sometimes record audio unknowingly. This feature can be turned off completely if paranoia strikes. In my case it had recorded roughly a dozen audio exchanges that I was unaware of.
What unexpected voice clips did you find? Let me know in the comments!