Google privacy rules changed today. Here’s what to do if you missed the deadline to protect yourself

Google’s motto is “Don’t be evil.”

But that’s no reason to hand over personal data, no questions asked.

Even though the tech behemoth’s new unified privacy policy takes effect Thursday, there are still ways to protect your data from being captured by Google.

The new policy means all the information Google collects about you on its platforms — including YouTube — will be put into one database so advertisers can get a better idea of consumer patterns and behaviour.

Google’s new privacy policy takes despite global concerns

Before the changed policy, your search history and the sites you visited were kept apart from other details Google gathered about you.

Now, all the data is consolidated on a server so Google can treat you as a single user across Google+ and YouTube, Gmail and Google search. Only, as Electronic Frontier Foundation points out, just looking at search terms can reveal information about your age, sex, sexual orientation, health, location, religion and all kinds of other really personal stuff about you.

Alma Whitten, Google’s director of privacy for products and engineering, says the move is about helping consumers. Rather than 60 different privacy policies across Google products, there will be one. The information sharing also means more tailored searches and recommendations.

“We’re not collecting any new information as a result of this change. We’re not altering any of your privacy settings. And we still won’t sell your personal information to advertisers. We just want to use the information you already trust us with to make your experience better,” wrote Whitten in the Sacramento Bee.

Still, the only way to escape entirely is to stop using Google and family.

But while the deadline for purging your search history is over, there are some things you can do to keep your personal data safe online short of deleting your Google account and flushing your Android phone.

EFF has these tips:

Don’t put personal information (name, credit card number, address, social insurance number) in your search engine.

Don’t log in to your search engine — sign out of Gmail or Google+ before searching. There are also alternative search engines available — like http://duckduckgo.com/Duck Duck Go,END which has a no-tracking policy.

Block “cookies” from your search engine through your browser privacy settings.

Vary or hide your IP address. (This is more complicated and can be done using special software.)

It’s also a good idea to look at privacy settings on https://www.google.com/dashboard/Google DashboardEND — a list of your data, chats and documents stored in your Google services. Then, by using Google’s https://www.google.com/settings/u/0/ads/preferences/Ad PreferencesEND, you can opt out of personalized ads based on search results.

You can also “liberate your data” using https://www.google.com/takeout/Google TakeoutEND. This service allows you to download the information Google has on you, then delete whatever you want manually.

There is the off chance that the privacy policy will not remain the way it is now. The French data protection watchdog CNIL is leading a Europe-wide investigation into how the policy violates European Union legislation. In a letter to Google, CNIL said it and the EU “have strong doubts about the lawfulness and fairness of such processing, and its compliance with European data protection legislation.”

The Toronto Star
Alyshah Hasham      
Staff Reporter