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Want to know what Google has been keeping track of?

November 5th, 2009 by Sean Wilcoxson

For all the praise it receives for its ground-breaking services and the advances they’ve introduced to our use of the internet, Google has also been viewed as a pioneer of dubious intentions, an increasingly vocal chorus of criticism rallying around what some denounce as the company’s tendency to overstep its bounds where privacy is concerned.

While there’s no denying that Google’s products have ushered in a considerable shift in how we take advantage of the ever-evolving internet, concerns have been raised about what many perceive to be intrusions on their privacy. No matter which Google service you’re using – search engine, email, blogs, news, videos, shopping – the company logs your activity, collecting data about every action you take.

For many of these, Google requires your permission to exact that information, but the sheer number of services makes it difficult for the average user to keep track of what’s being collected.

To assist in that effort, Google has unveiled the Google Dashboard, a helpful tracker that sums up every bit of information Google has collected about your profile from the moment of use. This includes everything from the latest blog you’ve read to the number of emails contained within your Gmail account, giving you a compilation of your ongoing activity while using Google’s services.

For those concerned about security, this is not contained on a server, restricting this information to just your web browser.

This tool can be used only for those Google products which require your login information.

The information Google Dashboard will sum up for you includes:

• Web history
• email
• Calendar
• Youtube
• iGoogle
• Latitude
• Reader
• Shopping
• Voice
• Contacts
• Finance
• Friend Connect
• Tasks
• Picasa
• Mobile sync
• Orkut
• Blogs
• Docs
• Account and profile
• Alerts
• Search engine

At this time, despite the persistent questions about how Google uses the information they collect, we feel that you should not be overly concerned with your use of their products. If you have any questions about your use of a Google service, give one of our technicians a call.

Related posts:

1. Google makes it easy to combat the flu.
2. Google Voice pushes telecommunications forward.
3. Let’s ride the Google Wave!
4. Googsystray notifies you of new activity in all your Google Services
5. Google offers a Public (and free!) DNS

Tags: dashboard, Google, internet, privacy, security

2 Responses to “Want to know what Google has been keeping track of?”

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