Hacker News Reader

Comment by misterman0 | Hacker News Reader

>> I'd be interested to know if this data (i.e. non-Google search engine queries) is sent to Google.

Because Chrome keeps a log of all your activity, your DDG searches are easy to find here: https://myactivity.google.com/myactivity

So if you're web based (like me) then activities such as sending an email, checking out YT, reading HN, watching Twitch, and jerking off, all end up as entries in that log file.

View on HN

This relies on several things:

* Enabling Chrome Sync, which is opt-in

* Syncing history, which is on by default if you enable sync

* Not using a custom passphrase for sync data (not using one is the default)

* Having "My Activity" save "Web & App activity", which is opt-out

* Having synced Chrome history data sent to "Web & App activity", which is opt-out

For the last two bullets, the opt-outs are at https://myaccount.google.com/activitycontrols .

Chrome Sync is so sweet though. It's probably pretty close to impossible to live w/o Chrome Sync. It's my favorite tech feature. The USP for me is "As a user I want switch devices while I'm browsing, so whatever I was reading prior to having to go to the bath room I can seamlessly continue reading."

Am I missing something? Since I can do that with Firefox Sync too. Even more i can send a tab from my device to any number of other devices too.

Safari does it, too, I believe (I don't really use it... One man's "pretty close to impossible to live w/o" is another man's "eh? what?")

Unless you turned that off, or never enabled it in the first place.

Edit: And presumably you're using Incognito for... some of those activities, which wouldn't be captured regardless.

>> which wouldn't be captured regardless

They would be captured by the ISP.

Did you know that Google happens to partner up with a lot of ISPs? Hmm, I wonder what for. What could they possibly have that Google needs?

;)

edge caching :-)

Like most search engines DuckDuckGo uses https so your isp can’t see what you search for.

But they can know which domains you visit, which would strongly imply a number of searches using DuckDuckGo, which might be interesting to Google.

> They would be captured by the ISP.

Ever heard of https?

Yes. As you have pointed out, the ISP can only log a host name [0]. Well, if the user story is porn, then as it happens, host names are pretty darn telling. Also, looking at a list of host names in chronological order might help them to classify me as "closet this" or "closet that", as I find myself less and less inhibited by society's rules the closer I come to crescendo.

https://www.upturn.org/reports/2016/what-isps-can-see/

EDIT: spelling

So if you're web based (like me) then activities such as sending an email, checking out YT, reading HN, watching Twitch, and jerking off, all end up as entries in that log file.

Do you really think Google would have trained an AI to determine that last activity? How would they have trained the AI?

Presumably you aren't visiting porn sites for the articles. Voila, no AI needed.

Presumably you aren't visiting porn sites for the articles. Voila, no AI needed.

Sloppy. How do they know I'm not preparing for actual intercourse? How do they know I'm not downloading porn for later? I could also be watching gun videos, since they've been hosted there.

Granted, it's probably 95% accurate.

Since I've already outed myself as a porn consumer I might as well get this off my chest: the recommendation engines of the video sites I visit (all the big ones) have poor, very poor AI. It's like they don't know me as a customer. I'm out here busting my balls to find "The Perfect Clip" but it's a jungle and they are not making it easy on me.

I'm out here busting my balls to find "The Perfect Clip"

I think the causal order is flipped around here.

>> Do you really think

Yes!

>> How

How graphic do you want me to be? But isn't the real question: is there utility for an ad network to know about your preferences in porn? If there is such utility, you're best to believe Google implemented a way to get them.

If I was an ad network I would love to hear about your porn habits. I would absolutely love it.

How graphic do you want me to be?

If you know, you are obviously one of the people who has that data. If you don't know, you aren't.

If I was an ad network I would love to hear about your porn habits. I would absolutely love it.

Such networks don't have to know whether or not and the exact moment a given user jerks it. Though, it would actually be better if you were actively browsing around and not jerking it currently. I guess that's why discovery and AI are so bad on porn sites. It's actually better for their ad revenue!

Reply on news.ycombinator.com