Google Tracks Users Locations Even When The Feature Is Turned Off

Google Tracks Users Locations Without Permission

If you thought your spouse was sneaky, you must haven’t heard the latest news about Google’s foolery.

The famous search engine still tracks users locations, even when the location history feature is turned off. The Associated Press reports:

Storing your minute-by-minute travels carries privacy risks and has been used by police to determine the location of suspects — such as a warrant that police in Raleigh, North Carolina, served on Google last year to find devices near a murder scene. So the company lets you “pause” a setting called Location History.

However, there is another solution to getting Google out your business temporarily:

To stop Google from saving these location markers, the company says, users can turn off another setting, one that does not specifically reference location information. Called “Web and App Activity” and enabled by default, that setting stores a variety of information from Google apps and websites to your Google account.

When paused, it will prevent activity on any device from being saved to your account. But leaving “Web & App Activity” on and turning “Location History” off only prevents Google from adding your movements to the “timeline,” its visualization of your daily travels. It does not stop Google’s collection of other location markers.

It ain’t safe, it ain’t safe.