This is becoming a disturbing trend. First we find that the iPhone’s GPS can be turned off – but it doesn’t really turn off.
Next we found that our cell carriers were tracking us with CarrierIQ. Three members of a national agency I will not name learned in my training that their phones were carrying this provider-installed backdoor/root kit, and expressed mighty displeasure on the spot.
Now I find detailed instructions for removing your Google search history – which caution that you cannot really remove your Google search history. (Thanks again, Herbbie!)
The Electronic Frontier Foundation provides a nice guide at xxx, though the process presupposes you already have a Google account. What struck me most was this:
Note that disabling Web History in your Google account will not prevent Google from gathering and storing this information and using it for internal purposes. It also does not change the fact that any information gathered and stored by Google could be sought by law enforcement.
With Web History enabled, Google will keep these records indefinitely; with it disabled, they will be partially anonymized after 18 months, and certain kinds of uses, including sending you customized search results, will be prevented. If you want to do more to reduce the records Google keeps, the advice in EFF’s Six Tips to Protect Your Search Privacy white paper remains relevant.
If you’re at all concerned about privacy (and/or about Google), read the article at https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2012/02/how-remove-your-google-search-history-googles-new-privacy-policy-takes-effect. Even further, we may have arrived at the point where only the uninformed use Google for searching, or at all.