Google Web/Search History Disable Does Nothing (2014) | Hacker News Reader

Google Web/Search History Disable Does Nothing (2014)

jacquesmattheij.com

29 pointsselinalau13 comments

Not that I'm a fan of big brother, but I think there's a genuine difference between logging all requests and logging and attaching to your user profile all requests? I know that they could infer pretty reliably back to you with just the request information, but I'm not sure that "does nothing" is strictly true here.

Anecdotally, I've gotten curious and messed with this setting. I'm pretty confident (>80%) that I could see a difference in what ads I was served, with logging-disabled searches not influencing my Google ads they way logged searches did.

Honestly, this article felt a bit FUD to me. Google's privacy text never led me to believe they would purge all record of no-log searches, just that they wouldn't attach them to my primary profile. As far as I can tell that's still what they're doing.

I periodically delete my history (https://support.google.com/websearch/answer/465?co=GENIE.Pla...) but wonder how true of a delete that is.

Previously discussed at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7809055.

So let's say you're logged into google's services using Firefox. You visit a page and it downloads a bunch of google owned JavaScript and a few fonts and image assets. How do they connect it back to your account? Does that JavaScript have access to the google cookie, or does that get blocked by cross-origin restrictions? If it's blocked, then what are some other mechanisms to connect you back to your google account?

One question? What's the painless alternative? I'm as much paranoid as anyone who is greatly concerned of privacy and specially all information going to one big brother. Seriously, what's an alternative majority of population can follow?

> As an aside, if I were in law enforcement I would be paying special attention to those searches done by people who have the ‘history’ feature disabled.

spreading fear to use something that possibly ads at least some additional privacy. Great

Nevertheless quite possibly true. You hear people discuss VPN users in the same way

And Tor users, and people who Google proxy. Sure, as soon as we managed to spread enough fear that only criminals would ever do that "they" reached what they wanted.

This whole shit is based on the mysterious "lists", which as far as we know are just filters which are used with other filters to identify possible criminals. Even if there are lists its not relevant as long as there are enough people on it.

I see your point, but i think saying things like this is dangerious.

I do wonder about the effects of privacy-paranoia, but at a certain point it feels dishonest not to say this. We already know that people searching for Tails are fingerprinted on that basis. (And, confusingly, that Tor searches outside Five Eyes territory are fingerprinted, but Tails searches anywhere count.)

Of course, it's also worth pointing out that the cure for this isn't avoiding security and privacy tools. First because that doesn't help (someone knowing you use encryption still beats someone seeing what you didn't encrypt). And second, because normalizing these tools is a really good thing. Using browser privacy tools, and Signal, and whatever else you see fit isn't going to get an upstanding American in trouble, and it does help protect journalists and Turkish dissidents and all kinds of other people who benefit from these tools.

So yeah, it's a tricky question, partly because you need something quick-and-readable to say. I agree with you that statements about tracking privacy seekers should generally come with an addendum of "but it's still good and won't get you in trouble on its own".

https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2014/07/nsa_targets_p...

We dont know that they are fingerprinted like this no. At least not generally as in "people". The whole XKeystore thing is blown up by reporters who barely have a idea what they are talking about.

What we know is that XKeystore offers filters for this kind of stuff. This could also just mean that if they look for a german hacker actively that they throw a few of those filters in. There is no reason to believe from the data we have that these filters are actively used against the general population.

Dont get me wrong, i hate the NSA and actually the whole bullshit system the USA builds on. Also i am at least as paranoid as any other geek. But this topic is simply based on assumptions.

Edit:// To further clearify, if this actually means that these filters are always used with other more concrete filters it does mean that _the general population_ (who uses Tails, Tor, Proxies) never ever showed up in any of those "lists" people seem to care so much about.

It probably segments you into a more valuable advertising group if you click it. Your attempt to opt out is another signal that Google can use to target you.

I've always had the general sense that "uses uBlock" is a hugely useful advertising signal. On one hand, it means you hate ads and are unlikely to respond to the average crappy banner ad (or phishing attempt). On the other, it means that you're tech savvy and potentially high-income. That's some great info.

(Given all that, why are so many under-ad-space texts so bad? It seems like if you're going to target ad blockers under your display ads you could do better with it.)

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