Internet

NPR-  Google will destroy the private browsing data/history of millions of people who used the “incognito” mode as part of a settlement filed to federal court yesterday. For years, people who used Google Chrome’s “incognito” mode were informed that they could browse privately when they turned on the supposedly untraceable browsing option, but a 2020 class action lawsuit showed that the tech giant continued to scrape searches through the advertising tools used by websites. Google then used this data to measure web traffic and sell ads to its users. This is just a reminder that nothing we do online is invisible, NPR’s Bobby Allyn reports on Up First. In internal emails obtained by the lawyers, one Google engineer wrote that incognito mode’s “spy guy” branding was misleading. Allyn adds that Google got something out of this too. It won't be paying any monetary damage to consumers or any fines.