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'Google's Chrome Has My Dead Grandpa's Data and He Never Used the Internet' (forbes.com) 229

Posted by EditorDavid from the I'll-be-seeing-you dept.
schwit1 shares a Forbes article by Joe Toscano, a former experience design consultant for Google who in 2017 "decided to step away from my role consulting with Google, due to ethical concerns."

This summer he got a big surprise when he looked in Chrome's "addresses" panel at chrome://settings/addresses It turns out Google has info connecting me to my grandma (on my dad's side) who's alive and well but has never had the internet, and my grandpa (on my mom's side), who recently passed away in March 2019 and also never had the internet. This was disturbing for several reasons, the biggest of which being that neither of them had ever logged onto the internet in their lives. Neither even had the internet in their homes their entire lives! Beyond that, Google knew their exact addresses and their middle initials. I couldn't even have told you those things about my grandparents...

[T]he data wasn't manually entered by me or anyone using my account, but yet the data is associated with my account? How did that happen? The only thing I can think of is that at one point in history my grandpa gave his information to someone or some company in real life and his information was sold to Google at one point or another... But then that led me to another question: How did his data get associated with my Google account...?

Other questions I have: What other information does Google have about me/my family/others that I don't know about...?
He's now asking readers if they have any idea how Google connected him to his dead grandpa -- and whether Google is somehow creating an ancestry database.

Toscano also discovered Chrome has been creating a list of "Never Saved" passwords at chrome://settings/passwords?search=credentials even though "At no point did I tell Google to create and store a list of websites I had logged into that they didn't get access to but would like access to at some point in the future. Maybe in the Terms of Service/Privacy Policy I agreed to this, but who knows? Not the majority of us, and it's just creepy."

And in an update Toscano writes that he hopes the article will "provoke thought" about "why we willingly allow this to happen": Why is it okay that the internet is designed to be a surveillance machine? Why isn't it designed to be private by design? Is this how we want to carry on? Just because something is legal doesn't mean it's right. What would you like to see done? How would you like to see things changed?
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'Google's Chrome Has My Dead Grandpa's Data and He Never Used the Internet' More

'Google's Chrome Has My Dead Grandpa's Data and He Never Used the Internet'

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  • So? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by backslashdot ( 95548 ) on Sunday September 08, 2019 @12:37AM (#59170246)

    So what? Google has the right to tell us what they know from public sources. You know when I was growing up people weren't scared of other idiots knowing their name and address. It was all in the phone book. Own guns, cameras, and defend your home from thugs and gangsters. Fools.

    • Re:So? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by passionplay ( 607862 ) on Sunday September 08, 2019 @12:50AM (#59170268)
      Mod parent up. Phone books are public information. Public records get sucked in. If you want privacy, request a non-listed number. You can also do the same with a cell phone. The default is share all contact details. You can't cry over spilled milk.

      • Re:So? (Score:5, Interesting)

        by StikyPad ( 445176 ) on Sunday September 08, 2019 @05:31AM (#59170588) Homepage

        I mean, there's a reasonable argument to be made that public disclosure and/or reselling of personal information should be "opt-in" rather than "opt-out," but otherwise, yes, public information sources can easily be used to piece together relationships, as anyone who's done a bit of genealogy can tell you.

      • Re:So? (Score:4, Informative)

        by AmiMoJo ( 196126 ) on Sunday September 08, 2019 @09:38AM (#59170898) Homepage Journal

        In this case they almost certainly got it from someone typing it in. Someone had something sent to his house and entered the address, and Chrome saved it as it was configured to.

        Same with the saved passwords. Someone saved them. You can confirm for yourself that if you click "do not save" or disable saved passwords entirely it won't store them.

        This guy is a moron who can't operate his computer and blames Google for it.

        • He typed in his grandparents' middle names, which he didn't know? How and what for?

          We know that Facebook creates shadow profiles for people's friend's and family who are not even on Facebook. Or alive.

          Why would anyone think that Google is not doing the same?
          Cause they've deleted Google+ (at least for the users) - and replaced it with Shoelace?
          Cause they can't somehow create a database and fill it with any and all personal information that they can scrub from ANYWHERE?
          Cause they used to have a motto about do

    • Re: So? (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Justin Smith ( 4524095 )
      Cant forget about the Mormon genealogy data collection, I bet google has access to that as well

      • Cant forget about the Mormon genealogy data collection, I bet google has access to that as well

        Creepy story: I'm American but live in Germany with my German girlfriend. We only speak German with each other, so sometimes her English is a little shaky. There is an American military base nearby. I have an extremely rare last name.

        So some American stranger calls up when I was not at home, and told my girlfriend his name and that he was a cousin of mine, and asked my girlfriend if we were members of the of the church of the LDS.

        When I got home, she asked, "Do you have a cousin that takes LSD?"

        So I

      • Cant forget about the Mormon genealogy data collection, I bet google has access to that as well

        Probably. And it's not like there aren't other people doing family genealogy. I've got three relatives I know of (including my mother) who are busy running down genealogy links for the families in question. And it's not like things on public forums are secrets....

        • Re: So? (Score:5, Informative)

          by denzacar ( 181829 ) on Sunday September 08, 2019 @10:13AM (#59170996) Journal

          And it's not like there aren't other people doing family genealogy.

          OH! It is NOT! Not even close. It's a very special kind of genealogy that Mormons do.

          https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]

          "The LDS Church teaches that deceased persons who have not accepted, or had the opportunity to accept, the gospel of Christ in this life will have such opportunity in the afterlife.
          The belief is that as all must follow Jesus Christ, they must also receive all the ordinances that a living person is expected to receive, including baptism.
          For this reason, members of the LDS Church are encouraged to research their genealogy.
          This research is then used as the basis for church performing temple ordinances for as many deceased persons as possible.
          As a part of these efforts, Mormons have performed temple ordinances on behalf of a number of high-profile people, including the Founding Fathers of the United States,[47][48][49] U.S. Presidents,[47] Pope John Paul II,[50] John Wesley,[47] Christopher Columbus,[47] Adolf Hitler,[51] Joan of Arc,[51] Genghis Khan,[51] Joseph Stalin,[51] and Gautama Buddha.[51] ...
          In February 2012, the issue re-emerged after it was found that the parents of Holocaust survivor and Jewish rights advocate Simon Wiesenthal were added to the genealogical database.[74]
          Shortly afterward, news stories announced that Anne Frank had been baptized by proxy for the ninth time, at the Santo Domingo Dominican Republic Temple.[75]"

          https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]

          "FamilySearch is a genealogy organization operated by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (also known as the LDS Church). ...
          The resource is maintained to support the process of obtaining names and other genealogical information so that Latter-day Saints can perform temple ordinances for their kindred dead.[3] ...
          In February 2014, FamilySearch announced partnerships with Ancestry.com, findmypast and MyHeritage, which includes sharing massive amounts of their databases with those companies.
          They also have a standing relationship with BillionGraves, in which the photographed and indexed images of graves are both searchable on FamilySearch and are linked to individuals in the family tree.[6]"

          Mormons basically plan to gather, buy or steal everyone's DNA so as to jam anyone and everyone EVER into their cult, post facto.

    • Re:So? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by ArchieBunker ( 132337 ) on Sunday September 08, 2019 @01:09AM (#59170310)

      Last I checked phone books didn't function as a family tree.

      • Why would they choose your family tree to go after? What are they going to do with knowing your family tree?

        • Do you have a clue why gmail and all these services from google are free? The information collected is valuable. Someone will pay for it.

          • Do you have a clue why gmail and all these services from google are free? The information collected is valuable. Someone will pay for it.

            Ancestry DNA for instance? Or financial institutions doing deep credit checks, firms that need extreme security clearances. The NSA, well maybe not them because that might violate federal privacy laws. Though on the books privacy laws are being flaunted by corporations with the connections to do it like google and the government with ever increasing frequency. The public portion of the internet is Big Brother which like Dianetics was a brilliant concept by visionary people. We just refuse to believe that 19

        • Re:So? (Score:5, Interesting)

          by Daemonik ( 171801 ) on Sunday September 08, 2019 @02:10AM (#59170390) Homepage
          Well, for one, that's how debt collectors start harassing your family members who aren't responsible for your debt, real or faked, so they'll put pressure onto you.

          • Well, for one, that's how debt collectors start harassing your family members who aren't responsible for your debt, real or faked, so they'll put pressure onto you.

            Seriously, can they do that in the US?

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by novakyu ( 636495 )

              Yeah, if they want to be sued under Fair Debt Collection Practices Act [wikipedia.org], they can.

              If you meant if they can do it legally, no. Hell no.

              • Security Pacific Housing (Now part of Bank of America) sure did. They called my parents to put pressure on me for a non-performing loan. Trouble was: I had paid off the loan quite a while before. And the non-performing loan was not even in the same county much less on me or my property. Got it cleared up, but no apology. Lawyer said I could have got them kicked out of the state (unlikely, but a black mark against them).

        • Hey you, buy X. If you don't buy X, we will make your daughter buy Y. And we will definitely make your grampa know that he should buy you 2X for your birthday.

        • Why would they choose your family tree to go after? What are they going to do with knowing your family tree?

          When your dad's birthday is coming up, you will be served ads that fits he's wishes for a birthday present. When your spouse is going on a overseas trip there may be some of your interests that needs a boost during that period. When

          There is a lot of creepy things ad pushers, telemarketers or activists can do with that type of personal information.

      • Last I checked phone books didn't function as a family tree.

        Obviously, you've never been to Vancleave, Mississippi.

        The family tree, um, don't fork there.

        • Obviously, you've never been to Vancleave, Mississippi.

          The family tree, um, don't fork there.

          To use another computer network analogy instead of a car analogy, my family tree has routing loops [wikipedia.org].

      • and GPS don't work as tree neither.

        Still that's probably the way Google found out the link.

        TFA's author mentions he doesn't even know the actual private address of his granddad (as a workaholic, it was simpler to call his company to reach him), but he cleary knows how to drive there to visit.

        That's the key point.

        It's a well documented fact that Google Play Services constantly ping the motherbase and thus can monitor all your movements. (e.g.: the /e/ foundation about page has references to such publicatio

        • at some point they even had an interface to show "places I've been

          It'basic feature in Google Maps, they can even tell you when (each date if multiple times) you visited. Not only if you had maps open or the place as destination. It's opt-in, comes with location tracking. I actually like it very much and yes, I am aware about the consequences (and I wasn't born yesterday,
          heck my pgp key is 23 years old).

          • It'basic feature in Google Maps, they can even tell you when (each date if multiple times) you visited. Not only if you had maps open or the place as destination. It's opt-in, comes with location tracking.

            The problem, according to several security researchers (too busy to find the exact sources, but you could google^H... sorry DuckDuckGo it) is that the *display* of this travel history is opt-in.
            Google collecting it *is not*: Apperently Google records all your movements no matter what setting.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Kazymyr ( 190114 )

          and GPS don't work as tree neither.

          Hm. If the GPS coordinates of the phones of 2 or more users spend extensive amounts of time within a few feet of each other, some inferences can be made.

          • Hm. If the GPS coordinates of the phones of 2 or more users spend extensive amounts of time within a few feet of each other, some inferences can be made.

            A nice shortening of my long rant.

            (Though in my example, I was more thinking or 1 user spend extensive amount of time withint a few feet of a phonebook's address, given that the grandad never had internet nor a smartphone. But basically that's it)

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by e3m4n ( 947977 )

        Have you ever tried to set up an account with a banking or life insurance company? I don’t mean start something. I mean just get your online profile going so you can login and access the account you already have. They often ask you to prove your identity. Sometimes it shows addresses in other cities lived in in 15 years. One time it asked me what ZIP Code I lived in when I lived with X name. I didn’t even recognize the name. Turns out it was some girlfriend I lived with 30 years ago some 2

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by e3m4n ( 947977 )

          You’ll have to forgive Siri for totally fucking replacing one word with something nonsensical. I was making a reference to the movie “sleeping with enemy” I wish we had an edit button

      • You know there are other publicly available sources of data (for example, the Mormon genealogy data) that are a) connected to the internet, b) require no user participation to be included, and c) aren't the phone book right ?

    • So what? Google has the right to tell us what they know from public sources.

      So what? Legal right does not equate to moral right. It's legal for companies to build massive surveillance machines because the laws surrounding that kind of thing were written when you'd need to fork over large amounts of cash to get a PI to follow someone in order to know that much about them. People back then had large amounts of privacy even in public places because for most people, most of the time it was not possible to track

      • Legal right does not equate to moral right.

        This is where the idea of free market capitalism falls on its face. That company, or any other for that matter, is an entity with absolutely no heart and soul, whose sole purpose for existing is to make money. The larger it gets, the more disconnected it becomes from anyones moral direction. They become the Borg. An ant colony. Zerg. If you want to shape their behavior, it has to be through the legal system. You either create laws to fence in the beast, or it wil
    • Those piles of public information were public before the internet was a thing and were not intended to allow global megacorps to invade our privacy, profile us, resell us to advertisers and countless governments, and make us easily findable and stalkable. We should reconsider what is public information or at least put licenses on the data to prevent these originally unforeseen abuses. Google (which means management and every employee) is evil as fuck and needs to be stopped. They'll crawl through any lo

    • Please, do bring that gun when you face the cops someone swatted you with. And make sure to yell at them those same things you spouted there.
      Sometimes they can't hear well over their helmets.
      And all the gunfire that made you, your family and probably the next door neighbors, into less of a humanoid shape than a texture.
      And do deck out your home with cameras. Makes it look more like a paranoid's meth lab to cops.

      You don't live in a "phone books" world anymore, grandpa. It's the information age, haven't you h

    • old data has been getting into computers for decades, predating the internet.

      I got a call in a bout 1989 from my grandmother, wondering what she should do.

      She had just received mail addressed to *her* father (who built the house she still lived in). It was a pre-approved gold card with a $5k limit . . .

      Understand, my great-grandfather was well over 50 years in the grave at that point, having died in her childhood before WWII, Enicac and the ABC, etc. . .

      hawk

  • Isn't that obvious it would save those somewhere? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Admiral Krunch ( 6177530 ) on Sunday September 08, 2019 @12:46AM (#59170262)

    Toscano also discovered Chrome has been creating a list of "Never Saved" passwords at chrome://settings/passwords?search=credentials

    So when Crome asked you if you wanted to save the password and you chose never save. How the fuck did you think it would remember for next time if it didn't make a list?
    If you didn't want the list of never saved sites, just don't choose that option and just say no each times it asks if you want to save it. Problem solved.

    • Re:Isn't that obvious it would save those somewher (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Macfox ( 50100 ) on Sunday September 08, 2019 @01:47AM (#59170352)

      Kind of interesting that someone that contracted to Google lacks the the ability to grasp such a basic concept.

      Hey Chrome... Don't ever prompt me to save a password for the site ever again and don't record I asked you to do this..... Ever.

      Are we sure he stopped working (with Google) for ethical reasons?

    • Re:Isn't that obvious it would save those somewher (Score:5, Insightful)

      by jrumney ( 197329 ) on Sunday September 08, 2019 @05:41AM (#59170594)

      Also, the "knowing my Grandpa's data" part - that chrome://settings/addresses page is where saved form data for address forms can be deleted. He, or someone with access to his account, must have entered it sometime - the only info here is what you have typed into a form sometime, not random info Google is finding about your relatives in public sources.

      I'm sure Google is not too upset about him quitting, he doesn't seem to meet up to what I'd expect their normal minimum standards would be for a technical position.

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by Topwiz ( 1470979 )

        They probably forgot that 10 years ago they ordered grandpa a birthday present from Amazon or some other website and typed in his address to the order form.

      • I'm sure Google is not too upset about him quitting, he doesn't seem to meet up to what I'd expect their normal minimum standards would be for a technical position.

        He says he was an "experience design consultant". That's not really a technical position.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by e3m4n ( 947977 )

      Yea I'm rather thankful for the ‘stop fucking asking me’ option. Not that I trust Google with anything else, but I’m glad I have the option not to be nagged all the time

    • I'm sure Google is not too upset about him quitting, he doesn't seem to meet up to what I'd expect their normal minimum standards would be for a technical position.

      Also, the text around that comment is weird. The author says:

      At no point did I tell Google to create and store a list of websites I had logged into that they didn't get access to but would like access to at some point in the future.

      Does he seriously believe that Google accesses the accounts for which he does store credentials? That would be a blatant violation of federal law, and one which they would absolutely get caught committing if they did.

      As it happens, I know a little about how passwords entered

  • Isn't this type of information available in public record?

    I did some skip tracing years ago. I had access to relatives , neighbors, public record, etc.

    So yeah , that's how

    • of course, it really is a stupid question for any adult U.S. citizen to be asking. Where do they think businesses get junk mail contacts? where do they think pollsters get phone numbers and addresses? Jeez.

      For decades, here is what is public that companies can use (and many states have lists on internet):

      your name, address, phone number, age, drivers license number, whether you are registered voter or not, any convictions, marital status and spouse and parents of the wed, divorces, death records

      an

      • oh yeah, forgot, also all real estate transactions including sale price and all parties that signed mortgage or title

  • I have a much more likely explanation (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 08, 2019 @01:03AM (#59170300)

    Someone typed in his grandfather's address once over the past 10 years and either forgot about it or he was not aware of it (because for example his wife or children used his computer). Computers are not magic. There is no way for Google to magically link this person to his grandfather unless someone gave away this information in the first place.

    And it's irrelevant whether the grandfather used the internet or not. What's relevant is whether someone talked about the grandfather using the internet.

    • Exactly so. This is the list of addresses saved when they were entered in a web form, remembered (optionally) so you can enter it again later. It's not some magic web search of everybody related to you for no discernible purpose.

    • How is facebook able to build shadow profiles for people who don't even have accounts? They are filling in the blanks.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by kwerle ( 39371 )

        Bob has never used facebook. His friends Sue and Dan are both avid users. Sue and Dan both uploaded their contact lists - which include Bob.

        Facebook also scraped public records for Bob.

        Facebook instantly infers lots of stuff about Bob. They know where he lives. They know where he went to school. They know who his friends are. Bob's nephew entered his family tree on some site. So Facebook knows his whole family back 10 generations and also his kids' names.

        Your lives are as private as your loudest frie

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by keltor ( 99721 ) *
      That particular list is definitely 100% from entered form data. That is of course NOT to say that Google doesn't have some mystical family tree of public information and data on you, just that the location in question is simply not it.

    • Someone typed in his grandfather's address once over the past 10 years and either forgot about it or he was not aware of it (because for example his wife or children used his computer).

      He probably ordered something to be delivered to his grandfather.

    • "My parents entered his information when I was logged into their home desktop between April 2019 and June 2019 while my computer was getting fixed after serious water damage. I thought this might have been a real possibility. However, I found out that they had not. He passed away on March 1st, 2019 and they said the only time theyâ(TM)ve used his information anywhere is with the lawyers, estate managers, bankers, etc who were helping in the process of our family dealing with his death."

      That's in TFA as

    • +1. At some point, he used UPS/USPS/FedEx/Amazon/etc. to send something to his grandparent, and it saved the address so it could auto-fill it the next time. This is not voodoo, and it's not even a privacy violation since it's local to his computer. Google may be doing all sorts of evil things, but this isn't one of them.
    • Yeah, the person who wrote the article is an idiot. It's bad enough that it makes me wonder if he's a Google shill trying to distract from the actual invasions of privacy Google are constantly doing.

  • Had the same thing with my Grandmother (Score:5, Interesting)

    by mykepredko ( 40154 ) on Sunday September 08, 2019 @01:07AM (#59170308) Homepage

    who died in 1991.

    We noticed it when my mother died last year and we were pulling together lists of people to notify and found my grandmother's phone and address on Google (as well as iCloud when we went looking there).

    The only thing I can think of is that I had her and my grandfather in my IBM VM telephone directory that was transferred into Lotus and, from there, into to my palm pilot that got picked up into my Blackberries that got sucked up into my iPhones which ended up on iCloud and in my Google address book. When she died, I thought I had updated the entry for just my grandfather (who died in 1997) and I couldn't find an entry for him anywhere.

    There's probably no magic to it - just that when you think you've deleted something, it gets marked as deleted but never removed from the database and pops up sometime in the future when the "deleted" meta data can't be processed. I've seen it with a few other contacts that I know I've deleted over the years but appear much to my surprise.

  • I've never Logged into the Internet either. Though I have been connected to the Internet since the mid-1980's.

    • So you only use the internet at libraries and on other people's phones and computers? Really? Do you really have no idea how technology works? Your phones has to connect to the 4G/lLTE network. It has a unique identifier associated with you, the phone's registered owner. That billing info is your name, address, phone, credit card at a minimum. Your credit card company has a list of all your purchases. The credit agencies do, too. Which means the government and banks do, too. And so on. You are ve

      • You are very definitely "logged in" to the internet.
        You probably don't get his subtile sarcasm.
        No, he is not "logged in into the internet". Nor am I. But at the moment I'm logged into /. And I'm *connected to the internet*

  • I have a new conspiracy theory: that Google themselves are deliberately poisoning the well with privacy complaints so ridiculous that we learn to dismiss them as mere paranoia, then when there is a real issue nobody will pay attention.

    3: Profit!

  • if you are concerned about privacy - (Score:5, Insightful)

    by swell ( 195815 ) <jabberwock@poetic.com> on Sunday September 08, 2019 @01:24AM (#59170330)

    why are you using Chrome?

    Perhaps you have heard of Firefox, the privacy oriented browser? There are others too. And there are add-ons that can help protect your privacy.

    After all these years, anyone using a Google (or FB, etc) product who expects privacy has to be considered a fool.

    Ultimately there is no protection. Your data is out there. Google and others will find it. But don't hand it to them on a silver platter and then complain about it.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by fred911 ( 83970 )

      ''But don't hand it to them on a silver platter and then complain about it.''

      There's no handing that isn't permissive and fully disclosed by the TOS that is presented each and every time a user opts to use the service. Many of the products and services have ability to choose what or if to share certain type of data. All of them have a dashboard that is easily deleted. I've used their products since they were invite and I've never seem them break any of the terms without notification [and with the ability to

      •   You don't have a right to receive service from a business without providing something of value to make useage mutually beneficial.

        Incorrect. I do have the right to receive service from a business without providing something if the business doesn't ask for something in return for providing the service.
        No that there are many businesses that provide services without asking for something in return.

      • This post you're reading has a TOS. By reading my post you have agreed that: a) you know nothing about the law, b) you're a google employee corporate shill, c) you are happy to give away your privacy forever (a thing of infinite value) in exchange for reading some crap, d) yermom. Yes, yermom. She's part of the shrink wrap TOS you just agreed to.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by tepples ( 727027 )

      why are you using Chrome?

      Received a pre-Crostini Chromebook as a gift perhaps? A newer Chromebook with Crostini can run Firefox, but older Chromebooks cannot run any application other than Google Chrome without first being put in the self-destructing developer mode.

  • Boy, are slashdot commenters upset when they touch their Google.

  • Cry havoc and loose the EU regulators (Score:3, Informative)

    by zkiwi34 ( 974563 ) on Sunday September 08, 2019 @01:37AM (#59170340)

    This sort of thing probably breaks a zillion of their privacy regulations.

  • Was digitized, and trying to communicate with you... Ya thats gotta be it.

  • Chrome saved addresses (Score:5, Informative)

    by jcam2 ( 248062 ) on Sunday September 08, 2019 @01:43AM (#59170350) Homepage

    Chrome saves addresses you enter for shipping destinations, so it can autofill them on other websites. Maybe the OP entered his grandparent's addresses one some website when ordering something online to be shipped to them?

    • Chrome saves addresses you enter for shipping destinations, so it can autofill them on other websites. Maybe the OP entered his grandparent's addresses one some website when ordering something online to be shipped to them?

      Impossible! It's evil internet magic!!

    • And why should they save anything when you were never asked to save it..if i do business at a web site and its an https site google has no business data mining on the connection don't ya think? for any reason with out permission and a way to say no.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by olau ( 314197 )

      If you actually RTFA, he discusses this and remarks that since it is in all caps, he couldn't have written it himself.

  • I have met a big number of people who have zero internet/ tech knowledge. They donâ(TM)t use email, donâ(TM)t know their own password. Still, when they buy a phone the dealer creates an email for them to log into the App Store. They donâ(TM)t even know they have an account. Of course the dealer doesnâ(TM)t bother with privacy options. So, google tracks them with their phone and can form connections because of their contact list.

  • Hmmm...

    I just finished reading the article and thought I'd do the same thing. I too found a list of never saved password sites but I mean I pretty knew that because in order to know to never save a password for a site, it has to at least remember which sites to never ask me to save passwords for or else, it is going to keep asking me over and over again if I want to save a password... LOL!

    As far as addresses goes, this one I was kind of dumbfounded because the only address it has listed is my own address. H

  • If you want to be really scared about companies storing and sharing your data, read IBM and the Holocaust by Edwin Black

  • The Mormons also baptized him posthumously.

  • I get a "site not found" error page.

    Granted I tried on my Android device, so perhaps this functionality is only available on a non-Android version of chrome
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion

    • Many people use the FB app.
      Many people grant the app access to the Addressbook of the phone (for sending messages or using video calls).
      The FB app uploads all your contacts to the server (or not? no idea) ... easy to cross reference in over night batch jobs.
      LinkedIn in and other sites do the same. I as sailing with a Lady and few others. We did not know each other before but exchanged phone numbers, so we can contact each other when we reach the boat and one is still on the way etc.
      Two days after I was back

  • I recently had a Google Photos automatically generated video titled "In Loving Memory". It was short, showing maybe four or five pictures that contained my wife's grandmother, who died a year or so ago.

    I only had a few pictures from my phone that she was in.

    How did Google know who she was? How did they know that she was dead? None of that would have been available from my google account. It doesn't use my real name either, but no doubt connected somehow.

    She didn't use computers. I don't use Facebook. My wif

  • Such basic failing of understanding it hurts my head.

  • A lot of ancestry paperwork on censuses, public info, if buried deep in ancient rusty cabinets, has been entered into computers and is available on ancestry sites. They can make reasonable guesses of linkages as people move around. I found where my mom's parents lived with their little baby, her own mom, thanks to a free trial. And what he was earning for that matter.

    • Nothing "buried deep" about it. States keep public lists of citizens. Also public lists of license holders. Where do you think pollsters got your name and phone number, or your address to do door to door questionnaires? Where do you think the junkmail senders got your info? Trivial for google to get all that (they know your license plate number too)

      Here's another shocker for those that somehow are unaware of all this, the companies can even get that data without using the internet (as they have been fo

  • So I see here some theorizing android phones or browser tracking or social media or other digital "big data" stuff. Nonsense.

    This Joe T. should know if he's an adult. What an ignoramus. How does someone reach adulthood without knowing?

    Where does Joe think pollsters get his phone number? or his address? or junk mailers get his name and address? or the phone books gets name and address and number?

    All states, for decades even before the internet was a word, have publically available records and any comp

  • ancestry.com, geni.com etc etc, internet has information about your ancestors who were dead before the light bulb was invented.

  • BS (Score:3)

    by Zalbik ( 308903 ) on Sunday September 08, 2019 @02:23PM (#59171684)

    "a former experience design consultant for Google who in 2017 "decided to step away from my role consulting with Google, due to ethical concerns."

    So we have a guy with a grudge against his former employer now making unsubstantiated claims about them.

    I find the fact that anyone gives any credibility to what this guy says far more disturbing than the possibility of Google actually doing what he claims of them.

    I'm not saying he's necessarily lying, but it's an anecdote, not news.

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