Google lifts the lid on user data
Google has unveiled a new tool allowing registered users to see all the data the firm stores about them which relates to their account. As well as seeing the data, users can easily wipe part or all of it.
The Google Dashboard is a single page listing the various services on your account (such as Gmail, Calendar and shared documents), each with a summary of the relevant data Google holds on the user. There are also links to the privacy policy for that service and the relevant page for changing the related privacy settings. Where appropriate this will include the option to delete the data which has been stored.
One limitation is that the tool only works with Google-owned sites and services which have been specifically linked to a Google account. In my case, that meant that my YouTube account – which I created before my Google account, using a separate e-mail address – doesn’t appear. That’s not a design flaw as such, simply an inherent limitation, but it does restrict the usefulness of the dashboard.
The biggest drawback, however, is that for most users there will be no detail about your history using the Google search tool itself. If you’ve signed up to Google’s Web History tool, there’s plenty of detail available, including even which ads you’ve clicked on, but for the rest of us there’s nothing.
Considering the company bills the Dashboard as answering the question, “What does Google know about me?” this seems a major omission. Many of us will assume the answer is simply, “every single search I’ve made and which results I clicked on.” In reality, much of this data is supposed to be either deleted or made anonymous after a certain period of time. That means that showing exactly what records Google does keep would likely reassure rather than concern many users.
Related Posts:
