Google has announced a change in its data retention practices and the addition of new privacy features across its core products, including its search engine, Google Maps, and YouTube. The search engine giant will now delete data on location history by default but is leaving users with an option to choose to have it deleted after three months.
Security and privacy upgrades to Android 11 have already been announced in early June, but the recent changes are focused on data that Google has collected -- particularly on how long the company keeps it for.
"We're guided by the principle that products should keep information only for as long as it's useful to you," Google and Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai wrote in a blog post. "Privacy is personal, which is why we're always working to give you control on your terms."
Google has received flak for the way it's been collecting and keeping data without the knowledge of users. In 2019, the search giant added auto-delete controls that let people set their Google accounts to delete history, every three months or 18 months. But by default, Google would still collect this data indefinitely.
With Google's new announcement, this policy has been flipped around. Now, new Google accounts will have their location and activity deleted by default every 18 months. For existing accounts, this feature should be turned on manually, as the company doesn't want to force such a change. As for YouTube accounts, history will be deleted every 36 months.
If your current Google account has over 18 months of data, the search giant will delete all traces of it and will continue to do so going forward. Users with existing accounts will receive notification and email reminders about the recent change, so they can review their data retention settings.
Google is offering users the convenience of retained data, like how it can give recommendations based on a user's activity, but without the indefinite storage. But while users can choose between the 18-month default to three-month auto-delete, there's a noticeable lack of smaller timescale auto-deletes, like once a month or once a week. It should be noted that this new feature doesn't apply to Google services meant for long-term storage, such as Photos, Google Drive, and Gmail.
Google said it will provide better proactive privacy controls and help users through managing their privacy settings. In addition, users will be given the option to access key Google Account controls through search.
