more Google stuff

[metaphortunate]

Either Google doesn't know a single thing about me, or it knows enough about me to know that if it told me everything it knew about me I would freak out and never touch a Google website again.

It's weird. I mean, of course Google taken as a whole knows basically every single thing about me: it has my email and my calendar, plus I'm sure my entire search history. (I've turned off Web History. Anyone who thinks that means they actually don't keep track? Yeah, don't all put up your hands at once.). What I'm looking for is confirmation that the left hand doesn't easily keep track of what the right hand is doing.

Mr. E and I have been talking recently about the difference between public and publicized, and levels of anonymity. I mean, in one sense, no account that's not free can be anonymous for me, because once you start paying for stuff it is tied to your credit card or your bank account or whatever. But I'm not a Chinese dissident, right, I don't need that level of anonymity. I just need enough anonymity that random assholes can't get my address and my parents don't find me bitching about them with a quick web search. Some companies seem to think that if they can't guarantee government dissident levels of anonymity protection there's no point in offering the lesser kind. But it's not true.

Comments

[lovepeaceohana]

Well, for the gender demographic category, Google's helpful little question bubble says something like "Based on x, we think you are interested in things that mostly ladies are into," which is different enough I guess from "we think you are a lady" - not sure if it's better or worse, though.

I think at this point I am just assuming that nothing I do on the internet is ever totally private or anonymous, and keeping my fingers crossed like mad that it's at least not as easy as it could be to track me down.

[kore]

I opted out of that way early on, I guess, so all I see is a 'You currently do not have an ‘id’ cookie.'

I just need enough anonymity that random assholes can't get my address and my parents don't find me bitching about them with a quick web search

All my addresses going back to about 1992 are online, which sucks, but at least they're a bit harder to find and there's no indication which is my current one. But I think addresses are online because of voter registration, which sucks. What I find a little more disturbing than regular people searching online is how big companies (like banks) often have really shitty security and trade information with each other, so our personal data is compromised from the start.

[ginny_t]

I'm in the same cookie situation. I suspect that just means that I can't see what they think they know about me, not that they don't have a profile built for me. But I'm angry at Google right now, and that's making me petty and suspicious.

[kore]

that just means that I can't see what they think they know about me, not that they don't have a profile built for me

Oh, I hadn't thought of that. Hah! Well, I've been watching David Tennant sex scenes on UTU non-stop for the last week or two, so I bet it thinks I'm a rabid Who fan.

[rivkat]

Your last paragraph is perfectly said.

Google, by the way, thinks I'm an older man. Apparently it hasn't noticed all the fanfic I read.

[veejane]

Yeah, Google thinks the same thing of me. I was assuming it was because I kept looking up "dudely" topics, like how to refinish furniture and what, exactly, the condensation on the outsides of my windows is.

Apparently there is nobody who looks up that sort of thing who isn't Bob Vila.

[metaphortunate]

I think it assumes you are a guy unless you look up a lot of girl topics.

[rivkat]

Right, I just would've assumed all the hot man-on-man text would have pinged "woman."

[desdenova.livejournal.com]

Given the number of pixels that have been spilled over the issue in recent months, I don't believe that these "some companies" think there's no point in offering less-than-dissident anonymity levels. Anybody with half a brain and a search engine can figure out what the point of it is. They just don't want to, and citing Chinese dissidents is a either a convenient diversion from that fact, or a deliberate effort to make critics look foolish.

[(Anonymous)]

Right now the companies decide how much privacy and security to offer, and the hoi polloi bear the financial burden of the results. Which is why I think the companies don't want to spend the money, and won't unless/until they have to bear the financial burden of their choices.


- Harimad

[metaphortunate]

It's not necessarily about spending money. How much would it have cost G+ to have debuted with a "pseuds are okay" policy?

[metaphortunate]

Maybe. I live near a bunch of these companies, and my friends work for them, and what I hear is that they are afraid that people will rely on this sort-of-anonymity, and then get killed when it fails.

[moominmolly]

That profile was fascinating, and I'm not sure whether I should be disturbed that it thinks I'm a young-adult male. It thinks I'm That Guy!

Some companies seem to think that if they can't guarantee government dissident levels of anonymity protection there's no point in offering the lesser kind. But it's not true.

Hear, hear.