[joefkelley]

I'm a Google engineer who interacts a little bit with this kind of stuff.

There are a few settings for this kind of thing. You can take a look at https://myaccount.google.com/data-and-personalization

The "Ad personalization" bit is probably what the parent comment is referring to. But it sounds like you're interested in the "Web & App Activity" bit, which will turn off the non-ads usage of your data. To a certain extent at least, since there are some grey areas.

For example, I'm on the team that sends Google Shopping emails. If you click a button to track the price of a specific TV, we'll still send you an email if that price drops even if you've opted out of "Web & App Activity". But if you've just been browsing shopping pages for TVs, we won't send you a general email about TV deals if you've opted out. Both of those cases are in some literal sense "web activity" but it's still pretty clear what the user expects.

But you might imagine- if you're tracking the price of a specific TV and opted-out of Web & App Activity, should we send you an email if a near-identical TV drops in price? We probably wouldn't, and we don't have anything like this today, but it's not quite as clear. And Google has so many features across different teams, I can imagine there's probably at least one where some privacy reviewer made a different call than what you would have made.

[lifeisstillgood]

Forgive the grumpy old man approach here, but can't this all just stop.

The price of a TV (or almost any common product) is driven more by large scale factors (cost, competition, features and brand) than the latest 4 dollar shift because of some promotion in some channel somewhere.

We are optimising for the wrong things. Computers are supposed to be our agent in the digital realm, reaching out for us, in our best interests.

If we turn off all storage of personalised information completely and utterly, 95% of everything I ask can be answered from context (please show me cheap TVs).

Look, i don't object to the idea behind the sandbox (it's always been weird that browsers tell the server what fonts and other settings exist. I mean who ever optimised for that)

What bothers me is that it's a google id. Just let me have a few U2F ids - this is my shopping id, track it if you may. when I take it out of the slot stop tracking me.

I am sure I am feeling extra grumpy today, but when we stop tracking and trying to find ways to make me buy, and start finding ways to make my life better, that's when we have a digital revolution.

[hhjj]

Yes we need (again) an inversion of control. At first advertising links only tracked origin (website), so announcers could target right website to put links on it. But soon advertisers realized you could gain more granular information in using more active technology like cookies, gifs, flash, etc. So they began tracking users and their journey through all websites with all privacy problems it entails. I think in terms of privacy the only level acceptable is the one you have to deliberately have to engage with to start "tracking" (that means advertising content must be displayed alongside publisher content and not personalized nor tracked through advertising company if the user hasn't engaged with).

I also think that marketing/advertising is bad since it distorts value perception but i remain pragmatic and we can't ban all advertising that easily.

[lifeisstillgood]

I wanted to expand on this a bit.

If we are ever going to manage the flood of data out there we need digital agents acting on our behalf. The AI behind the facebook feed or the google ad tech is a very early beta of those agents - and "on our behalf" may seem a stretch. But that's not just a cheap snide remark - I think on our behalf is a fundamental issue of how they will be built and designed and regulated.

Richard Thaler has promoted Paternalistic Libertarianism - which seems to me a very good default setting for digital agents working on out behalf. It's not however that simple.

I hope we shall see a Medical approach to managing data - where everything is shaped by the best interests of the data subject. But there are three major world views - let's call them European, US and Chinese for over simplified ease.

The Us view is caveat emptor - one should be rugged individualist enough to be able to calculate the best co-pay arrangement and by extension work out ones preferred facebook privacy settings. If you get it wrong you will be prey for the payday loan industry.

The European view that by default it should be good for the individual (although as a Brit I should sneak in that the state gets to define good. And I suspect the Chinese view is it should be good for the confucian society - and the state may have some say in who is in and out of that.

As we are entering the new era of regulation of tech, these conflicting world views are becoming entangled - and we coders will be on that front line.

Choose a side - and be prepared for some very weird outcomes.

[lrossi]

This is replacing one way of tracking with another. Can we stop it with the tracking entirely instead?

I would be happy to voluntarily provide a list of topics I would like to get ads for if I knew that this helps get rid of the cookie and tracking mess we have right now.

Think of a questionnaire a la Netflix that you spend 3 minutes answering to so that it gets your preferences.

The current system we have in place is not just creepy, but also crappy. I see it on YouTube, both the ads and the video suggestions are very poor.

[zwaps]

And yet there is no way to turn off tracking, because the data will be collected anyways, and will be used one way or the other eventually.

As long as this is connected to a Google account, well, then that's one thing. One doesn't need to agree to those terms.

Google is continuously trying to transcend this. Look at AMP, which is an attempt to run the entire internet through Google for tracking purposes. The strategy is always the same: Promise some sort of consumer benefit under the condition that everything will be tracked. Yes, one can opt out of targeted advertising, but Google still owns the data and uses it internally.

This new play is the exact same thing. As is all other efforts to track people, logged in or not.

Your choice is this:

Have an account and have everything you do tracked by Google (or the next company), give them all your data to use in their algos, and agree to terms that state that they can do whatever they want with the data. Perhaps then you can disable targeted advertising, although that also doesn't really work, does it?

Or, second choice, do not have a Google account. However, then you are subject to subversive attempts to track everything you do and use the data whether you want it or not, illegal or not.

This goes against some basic tenets of law in many countries. My data is my property, not yours. Google is powerful enough to not care, but make no mistake: People working for Google and making these decisions should be in jail. Any malice and hate targeted toward them is 100% justified.

[shostack]

Do you use any signals from people who opt out of Web and App activity to feed into models that are used not just for measurement but for targeting?

What if someone is identified by a model as being in market for a TV and then opts out? Would they still be classified as in market at that point?

I work in digital media, feel free to get technical with your response.

[joefkelley]

I'll hedge this by saying I can only speak for the teams I've worked on, plus my somewhat limited understanding of company-wide policies.

The answer to both questions is no. If you opt out, your data is not used for modeling or targeting or anything. Perhaps some internal reporting that isn't used for anything other than like PMs wanting to understand user behavior? Even that I'm not sure about.

If you are identified as being in market for something based on activity and then opt out, you will no longer be classified as being in market. That classification will be deleted- though perhaps not immediately but within some reasonable time frame, say 24 hours or so.