Google Knows Too Much About You

The world’s known search engine Google has never been a champion of personal privacy, but it seems to finally overstep the mark with newly introduced encompassing services.

Google has announced a few days ago that a major shake-up is afoot to a number of its services. Actually, the search engine seems to have switched from a Peeping Tom behavior to something close to full-on stalker. The website claimed it was getting rid of a lot of red tape that will provide seamless service between different facets of its business. Main part of it is relatively harmless: for instance, it would mean that keywords in the search engine might be used to suggest you certain videos when you visit YouTube.

This is not something users should be worrying about. However, taking into account the fact that your Google+ accounts, your location and even your Gmail content will also feed into searches, this may threaten to cross the line from convenient to plain creepy. Actually, the way Google behaves is expected to change quite substantially in March.

The company strongly believes that there are a lot of “cool” things it is able to do by “combining data” across its products. For instance, it might appear useful for you to get a reminder that you are late for some appointment based on your location. However, aside from all this care about the users, it is still a sign of the company’s ever increasing influence that is genuinely concerning. Indeed, taking into account the firm’s alleged abuse of its position with the information-spying debacle and other things, the level of trust Google demands is really phenomenal.

Google seems to combine all your peculiarities, including social life, search habits, and work in attempt to be with you at every moment. Meanwhile, one can notice that there is not much to be done to tackle Google’s changes. Undoubtedly, the main reason for Google to be so keen on delving even further into users’ lives is reaping greater rewards from advertising revenues. The search engine may keep claiming that it doesn’t sell your personal data, but it will benefit from knowing about you for sure.

Industry experts point out that this can appear the start of a backlash against Google. If you consider the way that the search engine has emerged relatively unscathed from serious privacy breaches previously, it might take much for Internet users to shift away. So, taking into account the claustrophobic feeling of the engine’s latest intrusions, public perception could start shifting.