We have come to accept that the technology we interact with on a daily basis is tracking and recording our every move.
Your smart phone knows everywhere you’ve been, Google Maps is always tracking your location, and Facebook has built a detailed character profile of all its users.
By following these five steps you can see just how much Google knows about you, your interests, the places you have visited, and your search habits.
1. Go to history.google.com/history
2. Make sure you’re logged into a Google account
Google only saves the searches you have made while logged into an unrestricted Google account. While it might not have every search you’ve ever made, it can give you a pretty accurate picture of your browsing habits.
3. Select the down arrow next to “last week” and change it to “all time”
4. Browse your more recent search history by selecting “last month” and “last year”
5. Delete your browsing data
You can delete the search data Google has stored for you by clicking the three dots on the top right hand side of the window and selecting “Delete options”. It gives you the immediate option to delete data from “Today” and “Yesterday”. If you click “Advanced” it then lets you delete information from the last four weeks or “All time”.
6. Google knows where you’ve been
If you click the three dots in the top right hand corner of the window and select “Settings” then “Show more controls” you can “Manage Activity” under the “Places you Go” tab. If you don’t have location services turned off this will show you a map of all of the places where you have used your mobile device. This is part of Google’s Timeline, which it launched last year.
7. See how old Google thinks you are
If you scroll to the bottom of the “Activity controls” page and select “Ads” you can see the profile Google has for you, including a rough age range, your gender, and your interests. If you don’t agree with the profile Google has created for you, then you can change it to make it more (or less) accurate. This affects the adverts you’ll see across Alphabet products.
