Firstly, I was pointing out one small example of Google's privacy settings being non-obvious, which the GP mentioned in their post. There are many, many others one could go into, but we'll stick with just user location privacy for now.
Also, minor disclaimer: What Google does or doesn't collect varies over time (as their policies and regulation changes, and in response to various court-cases). What they might have done according to one source a certain number of weeks/months ago they might have since stopped doing. But my point is that they cannot be trusted to follow the implied behaviour of high-level settings.
However, since you've refuted my statement, some examples:
1. Google's own terms at [0]
> some information (such as the association of your Google Account to your Google Wifi network) is stored by Google even if all privacy controls are turned off.
This is bundled with Google's tracking of the geographic location of each Wifi network to feed their WiPS/WFPS services.
2. As @lern_to_spell has alluded to, "Location Reporting" and "Location History" are separate settings; the former does allow you to turn off some (though not quite all) location recording for your Android device at least, but the latter setting is still very misleading, and the former setting comes with a sacrifice (some apps become unusable). See [1]
3. Even with all of the above granular settings and admissions in terms, Google still have demonstrated in the past that they cannot be trusted to follow even their own loose promises w.r.t. respecting user privacy. e.g. [2] [3] [4] - note these articles are spread over 3 years, and are about events from 6 years previous; not exactly a promising sign of Google's policies being corrected by the court actions.
Firstly, I was pointing out one small example of Google's privacy settings being non-obvious, which the GP mentioned in their post. There are many, many others one could go into, but we'll stick with just user location privacy for now.
Also, minor disclaimer: What Google does or doesn't collect varies over time (as their policies and regulation changes, and in response to various court-cases). What they might have done according to one source a certain number of weeks/months ago they might have since stopped doing. But my point is that they cannot be trusted to follow the implied behaviour of high-level settings.
However, since you've refuted my statement, some examples:
1. Google's own terms at [0]
> some information (such as the association of your Google Account to your Google Wifi network) is stored by Google even if all privacy controls are turned off.
This is bundled with Google's tracking of the geographic location of each Wifi network to feed their WiPS/WFPS services.
2. As @lern_to_spell has alluded to, "Location Reporting" and "Location History" are separate settings; the former does allow you to turn off some (though not quite all) location recording for your Android device at least, but the latter setting is still very misleading, and the former setting comes with a sacrifice (some apps become unusable). See [1]
3. Even with all of the above granular settings and admissions in terms, Google still have demonstrated in the past that they cannot be trusted to follow even their own loose promises w.r.t. respecting user privacy. e.g. [2] [3] [4] - note these articles are spread over 3 years, and are about events from 6 years previous; not exactly a promising sign of Google's policies being corrected by the court actions.
- [0] https://support.google.com/wifi/answer/6246642?hl=en
- [1] https://www.howtogeek.com/195647/googles-location-history-is...
- [2] https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2010/may/15/google-ad...
- [3] https://www.wired.com/2012/05/google-wifi-fcc-investigation/
- [4] http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-24047235