One can get a sense of the volume of data they are giving away to Google every day by considering all the things they do on Chrome, Gmail, YouTube, Google Maps, and other Google services. That is... a lot for most of us.
Google at least offers a thorough web dashboard that you can use to view some of the data being acquired, regardless of whether you believe the targeted advertising and data collecting are worth the free apps you receive in return.
It allows you to eliminate all of the data that Google has already gathered, prevent it from collecting further, or have your data automatically deleted after a predetermined amount of time (such as three months). If you intend to delete your Google account, you can also utilise these tools to clean the records; however, doing so should also remove all of the data linked to your account.
Here's how to use the options that are accessible to you.
Locate your data
Getting started is really simple: Open your Google account page in your preferred web browser, and sign in if necessary. This screen displays your Google subscriptions, the devices to which you are signed in with your Google account, and any passwords that you may have saved, among other details.
- On the left, click "Data and privacy."
- Look for the history settings. It is divided into three major categories: Web and apps, location, and YouTube.
- To get a complete list of this data, click the My Activity icon at the bottom of the section. You'll see everything you've done that has been recorded in Google products, beginning with the most recent.
- Select filter by date & product to narrow the results to certain date ranges or apps.
- To delete a filter you've applied, click the X at the top of the list.
- If additional information is available, click on any entry in the list to view it. You can open YouTube videos or websites that you've visited.
Delete your data
- When it comes to data that Google has already acquired and logged, you can delete it in a number of ways.
- If you are viewing the entire activity list, click Delete (to the right of the filter).
- You can delete records from the last hour, day, or a custom range. You can also select Always to erase everything.
- If you filtered the list by date or product, click Delete results to remove everything that matched the filter.
- Whether or not the list is filtered, clicking the X next to any single entry deletes it.
It's useful to have a central repository for all of your data accessible via a single online site, but some sorts of data can also be found elsewhere. You can remove your web activity from within Chrome as long as you are signed in to Google, for example, or access your YouTube view history via the YouTube website.
