What does Google know about you and me?

Privacy is a major concern nowadays since some of your information you put online can be seen by others. However, you may be worried about websites using your information for unethical practices. Something which may make you wonder, what does Google know about me?

Google is definitely one of the largest site out there with millions of people visiting each day. They make most of their money by showing specially targeted ads next to search results or on sites that use Google Adsense, like Hubpages. Now I know you want to know how Google gets your information for the advertiser to use so you can just follow along to see how.

A few days ago, while browsing the web, I got curious and decided to see what the “AdChoices” link on every Google Adsense ad meant ( I know you've all seen and ignored it). It took me to an interesting page that actually explained what the “AdChoices” were and how they collected information about you. Here is an excerpt from that page:

“While Google often shows you ads based on the content of the page you are viewing, we also show some ads based on the types of websites you visit, view, or where you interact with an ad or other Google product supported by Google's advertising services. In doing this, Google doesn't know your name or any other personal information about you. Google simply recognizes the number stored in your browser on the DoubleClick cookie, and shows ads related to the interest and inferred demographic categories associated with that cookie.”

I hope you don't find this too complicated, but to put it simple, Google places a piece of code in your browser that looks at the types of sites that you visit most often and from these they come up the categories that best fit your interests. Now you may be questioning what type of information they actually collect from you. Well have no fear, Google gives you the opportunity to view the information that is collected as well as edit it.

I was curious myself an decided to take a look at what Google knew about me and I must say, they were pretty spot on. Google had almost all of my interest categories covered, but my age was not really accurate since they placed me in the wrong age category, I'm still unsure whether they were saying I'm really mature or very boring.

I think it will be great and helpful for you to view your personal interests on Google. They are pretty accurate, but they give you the option to remove information that you do not want to be used. Just incase you aren’t interested in something anymore or you may not want to see certain ads.

To see for yourself:

Click the ad choices tab on any ad (not necessarily on this page)
After reading what you wish, you can click the Ad Preference Manager about midway down the page

Now you can view all your details at your own discretion

I hope you enjoyed this hub!