Following the awakening triggered by the Cambridge Analytica scandal in 2018, the understanding of digital privacy has undergone a complete transformation. Today, it is recognized that Google, above any other social platform, accumulates enormous amounts of information about our existence: from our geolocation via Google Maps to our searches on YouTube, our communications on Gmail, and the use of Android.
This systematic technological surveillance creates a detailed digital footprint of the user, crucial for the personalization of Google Ads. The good news is the data transparency provided by the company, which, in an effort to protect data, allows users to review their own location history and download their complete file through the Google Takeout tool. This exercise of oversight is vital to gauge the power that Google holds over our data.
How extensive is the data collection?
The unsettling nature of this collection is that it is entirely verifiable by the user. Google uses its search engine, email services, maps, videos, cloud storage, and mobile operating system to gather numerous data points. However, every term entered, every mouse click, every coordinate of your journey is a piece of data that the corporation meticulously archives. Although much of this data is justified under the pretext of “improving the experience,” its practical function is to create a user profile with microscopic precision. The download of all that information is done through the Google Takeout feature.
In some cases, the resulting file can reach several gigabytes, depending on the amount of information being downloaded: messages, geographic coordinates, voice transcripts, photo albums, search history, contacts, YouTube interactions, and even the browsing trail on external sites where the user hasn’t even logged in. Unlike social platforms, Google does not need the user to share details of their life; instead, it records them. Its infrastructure is fed by every device the user utilizes, and its interconnected service ecosystem allows it to track their activities almost constantly. From their smartphone to their desktop computer, each interaction generates a fragment of their digital footprint, which collectively builds a complete replica of their identity.
Can I find out what data Google has about me?
Despite the seriousness of what has been explained, there is a way to mitigate it by accessing this information and regaining some digital sovereignty. Google, motivated (or rather forced) by data transparency policies or regulatory requirements, offers several shortcuts that reveal the volume of information it has collected about the user. Reviewing these portals is an essential requirement to understand the profound level of knowledge this entity has about your daily life. If the user wants to check all the data that Google has collected, they can do so by accessing any of these links:
- Search History: allows you to review your search history, from the earliest queries to the most recent ones.
- Ads Personalization: on this website, you can check how information about your interests and habits is used to generate personalized Google Ads.
- Location History: via this link, you can view all the geographic points where your location has been recorded, as well as specific dates and routes, thanks to Google Maps.
- Takeout: this is the portal where you can download and export all the information that Google has about the user, from email (Gmail) to browsing history.
- Dashboard: here you can check all the Google services that have been used and the amount of data for each of them.
- Video Activity (YouTube Search History): this website stores the search history of queries made on YouTube, even if the history has been deleted.
- Third-Party Access (Permissions): Here all the applications, sites, and extensions that have been authorized to access or interact with your Google account data are detailed.