Google enables advertisers a look into your browsing history…

  • @0x2d@lemmy.ml
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    2 years ago

    I looked up “audiophool” on Chrome and I looked in my ad preferences and it started recommending stuff about speakers

    edit: grammar

    • biscuit
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      102 years ago

      That isn’t new, that’s how ad networks work. Google owns one of the largest ad networks.

    • @kescusay@lemmy.world
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      32 years ago

      That’s what people don’t understand. Google’s actual customers are advertisers, just like with broadcast television. The deal you make with Google is that they’ll give you all sorts of “free” services and software, and in return, you’ll see ads.

      And there’s nothing inherently wrong with that model. You get what you want, Google gets what they want, and advertisers pay for it all in the hopes that you’ll like whatever they’re selling and buy it.

      You can always stop using free services and pay for them directly instead, cutting the advertisers out. Or use free services from non-profits and open-source software.

      But the problem is that it’s also in Google’s best interests to make that as difficult as possible. To make avoiding their data-consumption damn near impossible. Collecting, comparing, collating, and indexing data is literally what they’re the best in the world at. And they have their methods of getting it everywhere.

      A broadcaster can’t stop you from turning off the TV or muting it during ads. If they could, they certainly would. (Thanks, laissez-faire capitalism!) But they’re not serving the ads AND providing the TV itself.

      Google is both the broadcaster and the TV manufacturer in this analogy. They’re saying, “Here’s a free TV. Isn’t it nice? And it’ll help us give you extremely targeted and personalized ads. Hope you don’t mind that we’ve made it hard to mute, and the TV never actually turns all the way off. And sure, it’s got a camera and microphone, but what did you expect? It’s free!”

  • @martinbasic@lemmy.world
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    42 years ago

    It just pop up in front of me few days ago, and then I immediately turned all the options off in the setting without any doubt…

    Luckily that it is not my most used web browser now.

  • Bappity
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    1362 years ago

    every day I’m glad I switched to firefox

    • @Zikeji@programming.dev
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      42 years ago

      Every day a new article comes out that slowly convinces me to switch. Chrome’s profile switcher was light years ahead of Firefox last I checked, but I’m going to have to check again and see if that’s still the case and if so, what I can do to cope.

        • @Zikeji@programming.dev
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          2 years ago

          I’ll have to check, a cursory look at the documentation definitely makes them seem viable. Those definitely weren’t a thing last I checked lol. As for the use case, I have a profile for job 1, 2, personal, and personal 2 (2 being a separate Google account for it’s collaborative stuff).

          For the most part it should do the trick. I dislike the branding for Mozilla VPN, but I see in the screenshots I can set custom proxy settings which will be nice.

          As one of my profiles has a unique set of bookmarks and unique extensions, I’d probably be able to use the containers to substitute what I’m using 3 profiles for right now, and keep a separate profile for the job with unique extensions.

          Thanks! Will definitely start migrating stuff over and seeing how it is. If I can still self host the sync backend I’ll do that as well.

    • @glad_cat@lemmy.sdf.org
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      2 years ago

      I may be cursed but I have never experienced any slowdown with Firefox. I never noticed the appeal of Chrome, but have I only used it twice in my life…

      • @ohlaph@lemmy.world
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        122 years ago

        Firefox felt pretty bloated for me back in 2005-2010 or so, they have greatly improved it though and I haven’t noticed a difference in performance on either Chrome or Firefox.

      • @Corkyskog@sh.itjust.works
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        32 years ago

        It works really well on mobile, that’s just about all the appeal I can find. Some sites are a bit glitchy on Firefox, but it’s really rare. I keep it around for those occasions. On PC it’s just Firefox and Edge (cuz work).

      • tim-clark
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        62 years ago

        I use a macbook for work. Chrome is ridiculously buggy and sucking every bit of memory. Firefox is almost as bad. Chrome is really bad when using more than 1 tab. Firefox has rendering issues with jira and git. Chrome compelling locks up when using meet, Firefox is slightly better.

        In my opinion all browsers have sucked since 2015. Slow, unresponsive, rendering issues, resource hogs. Overall the browser experience has led me to use the internet less and less. It is not the privacy, it is the basic functionality is not working consistently.

        • @SimplePhysics@sh.itjust.works
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          12 years ago

          Damn, how old is that MacBook? I think you should ask for a hardware upgrade, because both Chromium based browsers and Firefox don’t use too much resources and run smoothly on the newer models. I can’t say that Chrome isn’t buggy, as I barely use it, but I have never encountered a Firefox bug on any of my devices.

    • @kaitco@lemmy.world
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      312 years ago

      I’ve never left Firefox. Through their redesigns and restructure of available add-ons, Firefox has always been the better option because they’ve always been focused on user options and user privacy.

      "I don’t want my browser keeping track of my browsing history to help serve me ads, and I definitely don’t want my browser sharing any function of my browsing history with every random website I visit.”

      Then why were you using Chrome in the first place?? This feels very much like “‘I never thought the leopards would eat my face,’ says the head of the Leopards Eating People’s Faces Party.”

      Every single product offered by Google is meant as an ad delivery method to increase their balance sheet. I’m honestly shocked by the people who are shocked when Google takes steps that are meant to increase ad delivery when that’s always been Google’s ultimate goal.

      • @QuadratureSurfer@lemmy.world
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        32 years ago

        If you’re frustrated with Firefox you could give Brave Browser a try. The devs forked off of Chromium and removed all of the tracking that Google wants in there. It comes pre-loaded with all of the Ad-blocking features I use in Firefox as well, so no extensions needed for that. Also you’ll still be able to use the Chromecast feature if you really want to go in and re-enable it.

        The only thing you’ll want to do is to switch the Homepage off and probably disable the icon at the top for enrolling in their ad rewards program (which handles the problems that a lot of users here have with Brave).

      • @the_medium_kahuna@lemmy.world
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        22 years ago

        Firefox + uBlock Origin is a godsend. Shout outs also go to DuckDuckGo and the Privacy Badger add-on

        Fwiw, my experience with Firefox has been so good that I’ve started using Pocket and Thunderbird as well (both also developed by Mozilla). There’s a bit of a learning curve, but resources are easily found online, and the privacy and customization benefits easily outweigh the hiccups, imo

    • @dustyData@lemmy.world
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      2 years ago

      At least at my workplace they let us choose to use Firefox or Edge. It’s an official ICT policy that Chrome is explicitly banned from the network as it poses a data breach security risk. They pay Microsoft so there’s a legal venue to pounce them if anything goes wrong, but with Alphabet is like dealing with an alien monolith, they take your money, your data, your sanity and don’t even bother to return your mails when you need support.

      • stopthatgirl7
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        22 years ago

        Alas, we do everything on Google because we’re using Classroom, Drive, and their office suite. Since I’m already having to the use Google for everything, I just use Chrome for everything work-related.

    • Engywook
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      32 years ago

      Very… Brave of you saying that here. For me it’s the best browser out there as well, right now. Be prepared for a cascade of downvotes from Mozilla’s shills.

    • @treefrog@lemm.ee
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      242 years ago

      Brave is a marketing browser masquerading as a privacy browser.

      Just use Firefox. Mozilla is a nonprofit and Firefox is open source. It’s really not hard to switch.

      • Engywook
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        2 years ago

        Firefox is made by Mozilla Corp., which is for profit. Brave is fully FOSS as well. And Mozilla as a whole is a useless, unless we’re talking about their ability to take Google’s money (money which comes from Google ad businnes, in the end), raising the CEO paycheck and firing devs and making FF shittier with each forced update.

        • @treefrog@lemm.ee
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          12 years ago

          I just checked. Mozilla has both a non-profit and a for profit division.

          Both support Firefox.

  • @cyd@lemmy.world
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    1722 years ago

    “Enhanced Ad Privacy.” That’s the technology that, unless switched off, allows websites to target the user with adverts tuned to their online activities

    That’s some Orwellian shit right there.

    • @Ricaz@lemmy.ml
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      2 years ago

      This is how the internet has worked since forever. At least for Chrome it’s opt-in, and they’re very clear about what is shared.

      Edit: apparently it’s only opt-in in Europe so I offer my condolences

      • TheEntity
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        112 years ago

        I doubt this “opt-in” would replace the already existing tracking. It being opt-in is pointless since at very best it doesn’t change anything.

        • @dustyData@lemmy.world
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          102 years ago

          It’s opt-out. It’s on by default in Chrome as they claim it is the safest option, and you have to turn it off so it stops sending some data to Google. I think only in Europe it’s opt-in, because only Europe enforces their citizens rights to not have their privacy raped by US companies in the name of security.

          • @Ricaz@lemmy.ml
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            62 years ago

            I live in Europe so maybe that’s why it asked me if I wanted to enable it.

      • @Woedenaz@lemm.ee
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        702 years ago

        It’s not opt-in. These settings are automatically set to be turned on unless you intentionally turn them off. So they’re opt-out by definition.

        • @Ricaz@lemmy.ml
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          72 years ago

          It is most definitely opt-in for me. It popped up and said “would you like to enable this?”, explaining what would be shared and why. It was not enabled automatically. That’s opt-in if you ask me.

          • @Woedenaz@lemm.ee
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            2 years ago

            I got the pop-up on desktop chrome yesterday and I had to intentionally go to the settings and turn them off.

            Maybe it’s different on mobile chrome? I don’t know but it was absolutely opt-out on desktop.

            I use Firefox as my main browser but work requires I use chrome for some stupid bullshit. Otherwise I wouldn’t touch the browser at all.

              • @Ricaz@lemmy.ml
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                12 years ago

                No… It pops up and asks you very clearly if you want to enable it. It also shows what it is, what’s being tracked, and who the information is shared with.

                • @LifeInMultipleChoice@lemmy.world
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                  2 years ago

                  I’ll have to take a look later but I specifically remember the options being auto selected. So you have to go to the options and uncheck them when that pop up comes up. That would be saying the default option would be for it to be on. So you would have to opt out of the changes. Opt in would be default option set to off.

                  Were you on a computer, or a phone. Also are you in Europe? I have seen some users say that in the U.S. it is checked by default (where I am at) and some users in Europe claim it is unchecked by default there.

            • @Ricaz@lemmy.ml
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              32 years ago

              So your region does not have laws prevent them from automatically enabling it.

          • @tony@lemmy.hoyle.me.uk
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            32 years ago

            I’ve been getting it on and off for a couple of weeks and that’s my experience too… you get a ‘we want to enable this exciting new feature’ and you click no. They’ll ask again… which may push me to use firefox more.

        • @derfl007@lemmy.wtf
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          2 years ago

          On android i got asked if i wanna turn it on upon opening chrome, but since they call it “ad privacy” I can see a lot of people thinking it’s a good thing when in reality it just makes it easier for ads to track you without needing your cookie consent. I do remember though on windows it was a “Hey it’s on now, go to the settings to turn it back off” kind of message

          • @Woedenaz@lemm.ee
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            2 years ago

            That latter message is exactly what I got on Chrome on my work computer. It said something akin to “Ad privacy is turned on. Go here to edit the settings!” and then you go look and they’re all set to be enabled. I had to turn them all off.

    • @dhtseany@lemmy.ml
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      482 years ago

      Sure, you’re forced to decline manually on every single browser you sign into, and the setting doesn’t sync across browsers so you’re inclined to just hit ok to the pop-up by the 4th or 5th time you see it. I finally moved to Firefox recently and I have zero regrets, it’s faster with a nicer UI.

  • Gikiski
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    22 years ago

    Going to suspect that Arc browser has similar settings. Based on viewing Preferences > General > Manage: [Privacy and Security]

  • Fr❄stb☃️te
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    2 years ago

    Uhhh…

    “Since your history shows frequent use of pornhub, we highly recommend websites like xvideos and redtube

    Because that’s totally what every 15 year old fellow really needs hey Google?

  • Jeena
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    1022 years ago

    Why not just use Firefox (while you still can …)

    • Marxism-Fennekinism
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      2 years ago

      Any organization that feels the need to outright claim without being asked that they’re not evil are 100% projecting and are evil.

      • @bobman@unilem.org
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        22 years ago

        Nah. In the early days it made sense because Google was doing some really cool things.

      • Phoenixz
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        152 years ago

        I think they honestly weren’t, back in those days, or at least trying not to be.

        Now google is a fully fledged advertising and marketing company

        I already dumped google search in favor of DuckDuckGo years ago which gives objectively better results. Google search has been overrun with SEO spam since years ago

        I’m getting rid of chrome, then of google drive, then what more… Google maps is a big one to drop too but it’s so nice.

        It sucks that a company builds good software and then just abuses the crap out of it but this is why we have open source!

        Lastly I’ll need to drop google from my Android phone, somehow.

        • asudox
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          22 years ago

          So you’re telling me that Bing provides better search results than Google?

            • asudox
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              22 years ago

              I no longer would trust Startpage much as I used to. When System1 got into it, I backed off.

          • Phoenixz
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            32 years ago

            Ik using DuckDuckGo. I do believe they’re using some bing tech, but the results are definitely better than google for me. Whenever I go back to try it again, google gives me only spammy SEO optimized results that are useless

        • Marxism-Fennekinism
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          52 years ago

          “Fuck it everyone already knows we’re evil no point in pretending now.” – Google, probably