Through its cookies, Google gathers a lot of information about users online behaviour. This data is used for targeting advertising and to personalise the different services Google offers. You can access that information anytime, but the links where you can do it are not well-known by most users.
This quantitative and qualitative information helps advertisers to target ads with great accuracy and provides analytics to evaluate performance and make marketing decisions. To check most of these links you have to be logged in to your Google / Gmail account.
1. Ad Profile
Google ad settings show what Google knows about you regarding gender, age and specific interests based on the search history on Google and YouTube. If you want, you can switch off the ads based on your interests. Once deactivated, you will still see ads but only based on other parameters such as your current location and language.
It should be noted that this is not the only information Google uses to target its ads. Visited pages, how many times you have visited them and for how long are also used as part of the Google Analytics cookies.
http://www.google.com/settings/ads/
2. Personal Info
This is personal information from your Google account, provided when you registered in Google. It is the most sensitive data. It includes name, birth date, home address, phone numbers, email addresses, etc.
https://myaccount.google.com/privacy#personalinfo
3. Location History
Users using Android devices share their location with Google. The location history shows your most visited places and all the places you have been. Of course, this is not something online Google does: iOS users also share their location continuously with Apple, providing information about most visited places and even time schedules.
https://maps.google.com/locationhistory
4. Web and App Activity
This shows the user search and browsing history on Chrome and other Google apps. Also, Google registers every ad the user has clicked on. This report provides a good insight into your interests.
5. Account Activity
This summary provides an overview of all your activity across all Google products, including Android, Gmail, Google Maps, Blogger, Drive, Google Plus, Photos, YouTube, Google Analytics, Google AdSense and more.
https://www.google.com/settings/dashboard
6. Device Information
It includes information about the devices you own but also your contacts, calendar and apps. Google not only stores information about your current devices but also the ones you owned previously.
https://myaccount.google.com/device-activity
7. YouTube Search History
A history of your YouTube searches. You can choose to switch it off. Video recommendations will no longer be based on your search history.
https://history.google.com/history/youtube/search
8. YouTube Watch History
A history of your watched videos. You can also access this directly from YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/feed/history). By switching it off, your video recommendations will no longer be based on your watch history.
https://history.google.com/history/youtube/watch
9. Apps and Extensions
This report shows apps and extensions currently accessing your Google data. It is a good idea to check the list periodically in search of unwanted or potentially malicious software.
https://security.google.com/settings/security/permissions
10. Data Account Export
Takeout allows users to download all their Google data with just one click. The resulting file includes everything we have mentioned before and more: personal information, activity, photos, documents, geolocation, emails, social media posts, etc. This is the most comprehensive report, it exports everything Google knows about you.
Very interesting. I had no idea these existed.
Well, they do ask you to enroll in data feedback at the start of any app or google Android OS installation. But it’s good to let people know about it.