Who you communicate with when using Gmail and the subjects and timestamps of your conversations The contents of your Google Docs and Google Drive files due to random reviews Your search history The products you’re interested in The YouTube channels you’re subscribed to and what videos you have watched Your location data
Fortunately, there are some ways to protect your privacy. A great one, provided you also take other privacy measures, is using a good VPN to change your IP address, such as Surfshark. For many people, Google is the internet. Anything you want, you search for it on Google. And over time, Google continues to learn about your preferences, your interests, and your hobbies. That’s why, in some cases, the auto-predict feature is incredibly accurate, almost as if it knows what you’re searching for. All of this is possible through a series of algorithms that Google uses to process as much data and information as it can about its users. How does it do it? What does it know about you? Here’s everything you need to know.
What Google Knows About You
Below, we will discuss all the information that Google tracks about its users.
Communications
You may have noticed Google giving you auto-suggestions or recommending that you add tasks to your to-do list, or reminding you about bills that are due. This information is processed from your emails. Google learns these patterns to offer better predictions and reminders. While the company does state that it doesn’t use this information for targeting ads, it technically still processes your emails. This might be alarming for some, but if you’re looking to move away, we have a handy guide on how to delete your Gmail account.
Contents of stored documents
Google also reads the contents stored in your Google Slides, Sheets, Docs, and other stored information to “personalize the experience.” Again, the company explicitly states that they do not use this information for advertising. They collect information to conduct reviews as part of their Abuse Program.
Search behavior in Google Chrome
It is very clear Google knows and keeps track of your searches on Google Chrome. You might have noticed you often get to see advertisements for products or services that you’ve searched for on Google Chrome.
Shopping information
Just like Google Chrome, Google Shopping keeps track of the products you’re interested in to offer you advertisements on deals and similar products.
Your viewing history
YouTube, one of Google’s many companies, tracks your viewing history, including the channels that you subscribe to. This is used to glean information about your interests, and to serve relevant ads. You can tweak your YouTube privacy settings to clamp down on what data is tracked.
Your location history
Thanks to Location History, Google knows exactly where you’ve been (if you have this feature turned on). This is even true when you’re not using a Google Service that requires your location, such as Google Maps. These are just a few of the many services that Google gathers data from. For a complete overview of all Google’s services that you use and the information they gather, you can check out your Google dashboard. You can also use Google Takeout to download all the data the company has on you.
How Google Tracks Your Data
First off, you should know that Google doesn’t just learn about you through its search engine. If you use the web, chances are you use some (or several) Google services. Some of its services include:
YouTube Google Maps Google Assistant Gmail Google Drive Google Play Google Pay Google Chrome browser Android TV
There are plenty of other services too, but these are some of the most popular ones. Whenever you start using any of these, Google begins to track how you use the service. The information is linked to an anonymous ID, thus creating a profile of sorts, which is shared across all other Google services. It then uses a highly complex AI engine to “predict” your interests and showcase content that might be relevant to you. Here’s some more detail on how Google captures and tracks your data.
Google Chrome
Google Chrome is without a doubt the world’s most popular browser. Google logs tons of data as you browse the web, including what you search for, the sites you visit, and then builds an advertising profile on you. This goes much further than just showing you the latest Samsung Television if you’ve been looking up smart TVs, for instance. Google can actually deduce facets of your life, personality, and preferences, by looking at your search history. For example, is Fox News your regular news source? In this case, Google can guess your political preferences and show you other things they think you’re interested in based on this. Are you looking at a house in a certain neighborhood? Then they might guess your social-economic situation, the number of family members, your preferred neighborhood, and a whole lot more. That’s why you see such accurate and relevant ads when you search for something.
Gmail
Google’s incredibly popular email client knows what addresses you communicate with and what subjects you converse about. That’s because Gmail scans your emails to combat scams and phishing attempts. In fact, up until 2017, they actually scanned the contents of all emails in order to create advertisement profiles about their users. Fortunately, this is no longer the case. However, it is unclear what has happened to all of the data they gathered this way and if it’s still used for advertising purposes.
Google Docs, Sheets, Slides, Forms, and news sites
Google has an “Abuse Program” in place for some of its services. According to them, this program aims “to curb abuses that threaten our ability to provide these services.” They also state: “We may review content for violations of these policies and take action.” In other words, it seems Google can just review your documents as they see fit, with the reasoning that this is to protect some greater good. It is unclear to us how often these reviews happen. However, we can only assume that, if Google wanted to, they can use these reviews to get tremendous amounts of data on their users.
Google Location History
Some might think you only have Google Maps to worry about when it comes to your location data. This isn’t actually true. In fact, Google doesn’t even require your use of Google Maps or any other Google service to know your whereabouts if you have Location History turned on. This feature stores the location data of your mobile device, to show you recommendations (for instance for restaurants) based on places you frequent or have frequented.
Google Shopping
Just like Google Chrome, Google Shopping collects tons of data about you. As you might expect, Google Shopping uses this data to recommend you certain products. Needless to say, Google Shopping also uses data from other Google services to get to know more about its customers: “Unless otherwise indicated, offers on Google Shopping are ranked based on relevance, including your search terms and other Google activity.”
Use a VPN to Hide Your Browsing Activity
Remember that Google needs to be able to associate your activity with you as a Google user to store data on you. This is why we recommend not signing into a Google account when using Google services that can be used without an account. But that’s not enough. Google can track your IP address and still log the data, especially if you’re using Google Chrome. The best way to hide your browsing activity from Google and other companies is to use a reliable VPN, such as Surfshark. Connecting to a VPN changes your IP address. It routes your data through an encrypted server, preventing platforms like Google from building an accurate profile. It changes your browser location too, making it seem that you’re accessing the web from another country. This is important since a change in IP address means Google can’t associate your activity (while connected to a VPN) with your account.
How to Remove Your Data From Google
Google does give you some options to delete the data that it has on you. If you’re cautious about your privacy online, here’s how to remove the information that Google has on you.
Delete Google services data
Note: Deleting a Google service and its associated data or your entire account is permanent! The process is irreversible. Therefore, make sure this is really what you want before proceeding. Of course, most Google services also allow you to remove individual pieces of data or files from their platforms. This is a lot less drastic and might suit some people better. For instance, from your Google dashboard, you can scroll down to YouTube and click on “Manage History.” You’re then able to remove individual videos from your watch history, for instance. Keep in mind that deleting your browser history will only remove information stored on your computer. It’s not going to remove any data associated with your Google account (searches, video history, location history).
Delete personal information from Google’s search results
This one can be a bit trickier. If you want to remove personal information that’s showing up in Google’s search results, the process requires you to make a formal request. First off, the result you want to have removed has to fall into one of the following categories:
Non-consensual explicit or intimate personal images Fake pornography that involves you or was created against your will Content about you on a website that employs “exploitative removal practices” (e.g. asking for payment to remove content) Personally identifiable information or doxing content Images that involve minors Pornography that doesn’t involve you but is mistakenly (or intentionally) associated with you
When you’re ready to make a removal request, go to this Google form and follow the given steps.
8 Tips to Increase Your Privacy on Google
Here are eight tips that’ll help you increase your privacy on Google.
1. Log out of Google services regularly
This way, Google will no longer be able to link your Google web history directly to your account. For this to work, however, you have to also make sure Google’s cookies aren’t tracking you. The easiest way to do this is by browsing in an Incognito tab or using a privacy browser instead.
2. Review your privacy settings
For Google Chrome, you can do this easily by clicking on the three dots in the top right corner and then going to “Settings” > “Privacy and security.” You can revoke access to certain things, such as the microphone, camera, or location.
3. Prevent Google from saving your searches
Go to your Google History and log in. Click the “Data & personalization” and turn off “Web & app activity.”
4. Turn off Google’s advertisement personalization
Google uses data they and third parties gather about you to show you personalized ads. If you want this practice, which can be quite invasive, to stop, go to your ad settings on Google. If you scroll down, you can also turn off individual sources of data Google uses for ad personalization.
5. Manage your Google permissions
Your Google permissions let you see which websites and applications have access to your data and what they can capture. You can also revoke a website’s or app’s access to your data. To do this, simply click on the website or app and then click on the blue “Remove Access.” Just confirm your decision for the changes to take effect.
6. Turn off your YouTube History
This will stop YouTube from saving the videos you watched and the searches you’ve done (both written and spoken). To do this, simply go to your Google Dashboard. Now, scroll down to YouTube and click on “YouTube History.” You can now turn YouTube History off completely, turn off individual types of data, or specify a time period after which old data will be deleted.
7. Turn off your Location History
The Location History tracks all the places you’ve visited (even if you turn off location on your phone). This feature might be useful because it shows you recommendations based on your (previous) location, but it’s not that great for privacy. To turn it off, simply go to your Google Activity page. Now, click on “Location History” and toggle it off.
8. Use a VPN to encrypt your internet traffic
A good VPN redirects your data via a remote server, so your IP address is hidden. This way you’ll be more anonymous online and services like Google won’t be able to track you. This is only true provided you’re not logged into your Google account and using Incognito Mode.
Google Alternatives
You can make great use of Google’s privacy settings and be very vigilant. However, the reality is Google is probably still collecting a fair bit of data about you. It’s hard to prevent this when using the services of a company that’s practically the embodiment of big data. That’s why we also recommend checking out some Google alternatives if you’re really serious about your privacy. Below we’ll list a few of these alternatives.
DuckDuckGo: This is a privacy-minded search engine that you can use to replace Google search. ProtonMail: This email client by Proton (The developer of ProtonVPN) is a secure email service that encrypts all communications. ProtonDrive: Proton also offers a secure alternative to Google Drive in their “Unlimited” package. OpenStreetMap: This navigation and map service is a more privacy-minded alternative to Google Maps and doesn’t track places you visit. Tor: If you’re truly serious about privacy and want to go one step further than using a private search engine, you can use the Tor browser.
Tor is arguably the most secure option if you want to improve your privacy, as it encrypts all your traffic and sends your data through at least three of its many servers to hide its origin. It’s a great privacy-minded alternative to Google Chrome.
Final Thoughts
There is nothing inherently evil about Google scanning your online history to help advertisers make their ads more relevant to your interests. Some people may decide they prefer advertisements for products and services they are actually interested in over random ads for things they would never buy. Nobody ever reads the terms of service agreements, so in general, most people automatically accept this. At the very least, it’s important to be aware of what information you share with the massive company, and what Google does with all that data. There are a number of things you can do to limit the information Google collects about you. You can use a VPN or adjust your Google privacy settings to reduce the information it collects. This way, Google probably knows more about you than you’d expect. Don’t like this idea? Then opt for an anonymous search engine. We’re talking about anything from your (private) files, received and sent emails and attachments, saved payment methods, and hundreds of other pieces of data. This can amount to so much data, that it can take Google hours or even days to create a data report if you request one.
