Last December, Google CEO Sundar Pichai admitted that the company could do better when it comes to helping users understand how to protect their privacy.
Now, at Google I/O yesterday, he added to that, insisting privacy is every consumer's right, and not just for those that can afford it.
In an opinion piece for the New York Times, published to coincide with the annual developer conference, Pichai stressed once again that people should be able to expect their privacy is being protected without having to pay for the privilege. It's a statement of intent, while also being a dig at Apple.
His statements come at a time when pretty much the entire tech industry and the whole world really is looking at the issue. In the wake of the Facebook Cambridge Analytica controversy, as well as multiple privacy violations by other services, we've started to really just how much our data matters. Even Apple's Tim Cook thinks we have a real problem on our hands.
Google has also received its share of backlash over user privacy, what with the huge amounts of user data it gathers. Specifically, it also uses that data to power all of its ad platform, a major source of company revenue.
In order to assuage these worries, Pichai used the op-ed to explain how it uses anonymized data to make its products more helpful. Basically, that data used to target ads at you isn't tied to your identity per se, but rather a nameless profile. He insists that ads aren't catered to you based on your personal data in apps like Gmail and Docs, but only based on things like past search results.
To that end, Google also talked about a bunch of new privacy features at I/O, ones it's either releasing or working on. One of these is Chrome's 'Incognito' feature coming to other Google apps as well, so you can use them as normal without having your activity saved. You can already do this with the YouTube smartphone app (which is a great way to check out a video someone recommends without having to later deal with recommendations based on it).
There's also a new Auto-delete feature you can set, that specifies for how long Google saves your activity data on both web and apps. More importantly, all the new privacy features now have prominent placement in your Google Account page, which you can visit to change your settings here.
Beyond this though, Pichai insists that the only way to further privacy protection is to regulate it. He wrote that Google officially supports the US adopting privacy legislation (something it's been pondering) similar to the EU's General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).
"Legislation will help us work toward ensuring that privacy protections are available to more people around the world."