Tech giant, Google has faced a $5 billion lawsuit for collecting and storing incognito mode search data of its users. While the company has agreed to delete the data, it raises concerns over the state of data privacy and anonymity on the internet.
Google is the biggest search engine in the world, processing around 8.5 billion searches per day and over 99,000 searches per second. Recently, Google was hit with a $5 billion lawsuit for harvesting incognito mode search data from the Chrome browser.
While Google has agreed to delete it, the settlement does not include cash damages. However, individuals who felt the treatment was unfair can seek compensation.
But this situation raises questions about data privacy and the reliability of features like incognito mode and privacy mode. It highlights that nothing can be trusted and there is no privacy on the internet.
The lawsuit also shed light on the data collection practices by search engines and browsers, even in incognito or private mode. It demands the company be transparent with its users and should have a limit on what data they may collect.
This revelation highlights how the search and browsing data, even in incognito mode, are not truly private, as they can be tracked, stored, and later sold by these companies.
It is no news that tech companies collect user data like location, gender, age, numbers, passwords, and search queries to sell and analyze the data for studying customer behaviour and market trends for better product performance.
Despite the search engine giant's claim that incognito mode data is not stored in the user's device, Google still collects this data, which many would consider to be dubious behaviour.
How is data collection done?The Internet browsers collect and track all user activities on the Internet, even in incognito or private mode. The data can be information such as age, gender, location, passwords, IP address, browsing history and more. Various methods like web scraping, are used to collect data, which involves utilising bots to extract data from websites.
What do tech giants do with user data?The information collected by the browsers is used to create detailed customer profiles containing all the behaviours and patterns on the internet. These customer profiles are then utilised to improve their services or deliver targeted advertisements based on your internet history and purchasing patterns. Many also sell this data to advertisers which use it to target their customer base and generate leads.
Lack of transparencyMany browsers are not transparent with their users and do not disclose the collecting and storing of data. Some even have the data transmission as their default settings and are silent about it to the users.
It is nearly impossible to expect privacy and protection from these tech companies. The users have to be alert and aware of their data privacy laws and should be careful about the information they share online. There are many privacy-focused tools and browsers which can be helpful in maintaining privacy on the internet.
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