Post (9): Privacy?

 

What we think we have control over on our computers and phones, most likely we don't. A lot of consumers have agreed to give up fundamental aspects of privacy when using their phones and laptops, and have accepted being watched by third parties as a part of modern life. But, when you do this, do you know what they are really taking?

Every single time you look something up on an unsecured search engine such as Google or Bing, they take record of what you have looked up, and never forget it. No matter how much you "clear your search history", it is never really cleared. There is always a way to bring it back up. According to Business Insider, the only way to officially go incognitio is to use a whole different browser, other than Google. Even though Google has its own "Incognito" browser, it is ran by the same people, and it does not fully hide you from the Internet world.

In October of 2018, Forbes Magazine did their research and found out that the Feds ordered Google to hand over their data because there were countless numbers of robberies happening between the same places, and they felt that if they had people's browsing history they could find out who it was easier and quicker. This seems sensible, but the only problem was they didn't know who was doing the robberies, so that means that they were going to get access to everybody's browsing history, even innocent people. Cops would send specific coordinates and timezones within the boundaries where the crimes happened and then Google is asked to give the information on everybody who was near the location of the crimes. Even if the people were just walking by or eating near the crimes, anybody who was running Google, even if you were not on a Google app then they were still able to get your data, because when we first open apps, a lot of us allow the apps to run in the background data unconscious of the decision that was just made. 

I find it baffling that anybody could just review an innocent person's search history as a job and not have a problem with it, but that is just the world we live in.