Google may still be tracking you…
Adding to the growing mistrust consumers have about what tech companies do with the data they collect, we learned this week from an Associated Press investigation that Google still tracks and stores your whereabouts even if you turn off “location history” in your privacy settings. It turns out that disabling location history, on Android devices and iPhones, only removes your location from the Google Maps Timeline feature — which shows you where you’ve been in Google’s data — but some Google apps still store your time-stamped location data, in part so they can better target ads based on where you’ve been. The company argues that it makes clear to users how to disable this setting and delete location history. So, what can you do to prevent Google from saving these location markers? First, disable a setting called “Web and App Activity,” which stores a variety of information from Google apps and websites to your Google account. Then, delete your location data in your Google account at myactivity.google.com.
