Google tracks you, even with Location History turned off

[HEXUS]

Confirm computer science researchers at Princeton University.

Read more.

[lilyx]

This is why I use Vivaldi & DuckDuckGo. I keep Chrome for certain things but generally use Vivaldi for 99% of things. Google are not our friends

[big_hairy_rob]

This is about as surprising as finding out that 'healthy junk food' makes you fat.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

The only issue is multiple apps might be doing the same as will your mobile network.

[Moonister]

...and yet there are people out there that won't buy Huawei phone because they're convinced that chineese will spy on them

[lilyx]

...and yet there are people out there that won't buy Huawei phone because they're convinced that chineese will spy on them

I'd be more concerned about the Chinese funneling it back to the NSA

[LSG501]

As said it's not exactly surprising, actually the only thing that IS surprising is how long it's taken to 'come to light'

[philehidiot]

Simply put, I assume that nothing I do on my phone is private. If I want any degree of privacy then I use TOR and private browsing but even this isn't entirely secure. Google has a mini stroke sometimes when I use TOR and just do a simple search. I assume anything I put into my phone Google (or any of the other major companies) knows. This is because I don't read terms and conditions. This approach has been shown to work as when I downloaded my Facebook file there was nothing in there I didn't expect them to have.

If I want true security then I use Kali Linux (on a VM for what it's worth), TOR and stick to SSL encrypted sites. Even then I doubt I'd really have it. I assume any Google services (or anything "free") is tracking me and for the most part I have nothing to hide. I once did a packet capture on my phone and the sheer amount of data being sent even whilst I was doing nothing was scary. If you want your eyes opening as to all the stuff your phone is regularly sending out about you, download packet capture and ensure it has the appropriate SSL keys so you can read the data. Then sit there for 2 minutes and look through the data.

I've found not only do they lie about whether services are tracking you but also if you want to even think you're disabling things then you often have to go through an insanely difficult route to do it.

These companies are insidious and one of the best things that ever happened to me was getting banned from Twitter for hate speech. This was after Frankie Boyle and Doug Stanhope blocked me for offending them. I tried signing up again using TOR but they demanded a phone number and there's no way I'm giving them that - it's like gold to them. Google does have my phone number but that makes sense for two factor authentication given the level of reliance I have on their services. I just assume they know everything about me... which they clearly don't as the adverts I get served are hilarious.

[plexabit]

File this under "Things That Don't Surprise Me At All".

I've had location history on for a while now. If they're tracking me anyway, might as well get the extra benefits out of it. I've used it a few time to retrace my steps.

[Wozza63]

This is why I use Vivaldi & DuckDuckGo. I keep Chrome for certain things but generally use Vivaldi for 99% of things. Google are not our friends

I tried Vivaldi but it just sucks. So many basics missing. Device sync, can't drag tabs to new window, can't middle click pinned tabs to close. So many basic quality of life features that are included in Chromium (Vivaldi's base) and even in IE that Vivaldi is missing. Shame because it does have some nice features.

Brave is a little better but still missing things.

[Strawb77]

This was after Frankie Boyle and Doug Stanhope blocked me for offending them.

you offended frankie boyle?
that`s a turn up- what the hell did you say?
what the hell did he say back?
jeez.
mind blown 8()

[Usernamist]

This just in:
Water = wet

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