They are listening...

A new message has been mailed from Google:

"Your service provider and data controller is now Google LLC: 

Because the UK is leaving the EU, we’ve updated our Terms so that a United States based company, Google LLC, is now your service provider instead of Google Ireland Limited.

Google LLC will … become the data controller responsible for your information and complying with applicable privacy laws. We’re making similar changes to … YouTube … and Google Play."

 We all know Google is the world's most powerful collector of data. This new message, coming so soon after we officially left the EU, suggests a deep and worrying undermining of our privacy by one of the world's most powerful data companies. Not only do they monitor everything we have ever looked up, now they are transferring the right to use and store such data from stringent EU rules to the much more lax US, where it can be shared round and sold on far more freely.

All this has suddenly resonated in light of grandson Luke's story that an unexpected message from Google had suddenly popped up on his computer, noting that he had a deep interest in coding and was young enough to want to go for an interview with Google.

Many of us now have voice assistants such as Amazon's Echo and Google Home. We might assume they only respond to the trigger words, such as 'Alexa' and 'OK, Google'. But we would be wrong: digital assistants are ‘awake’ even when users think they aren’t listening, and both companies have filed patents revealing the devices can be used as surveillance equipment for massive information collection and intrusive digital advertising.

Amazon is working to use Alexa to build profiles on anyone in the room to sell them goods. Future versions of the device will identify statements of interest, such as ‘Where shall we go on holiday? to target related advertising. Indeed, Jeff Bezos, the CEO of Amazon, has confessed that he unplugs his Alexa if he is discussing confidential information.

A Google patent application describes using its smart Home system to monitor and control everything, from what is watched on TV and hygiene habits, to meal and travel schedules and other activities. As part of its Street View, Google collected data from Wi-Fi servers in private homes to accurately pinpoint just where our servers were located. Even more worrying, Google was also able to download a lot of information just from the servers as it drove past them on Street View, including emails and passwords, medical histories, sexual preference, religion, and evidence of marital infidelity [evidence to Federal Communications Commission, 2012].

 Beware! I am now using a different (non-Chrome) browser and independent search engine to try and stop all my information being in the hands of one company.