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Google privacy update makes it easier for users to review and delete Search data

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Google is upping its privacy game – among other policy changes this week, putting privacy controls within Search, making it easier for users to delete their search histories.

The company’s new Your Data tool will show users what kind of data is collected and what controls Google provides to manage it. Placing the controls in Search make it easier for users to review the data collected on them and delete it.

"We’re making it easier for you to make decisions about your data directly within the Google products you use every day, starting with Search,” Google Director of Product Management in the Privacy and Data Protection Office Eric Miraglia said in a blog post. “Without ever leaving Search, you can now review and delete your recent Search activity, get quick access to the most relevant privacy controls in your Google Account, and learn more about how Search works with your data.”

Previously, Miraglia wrote, the best way for users to review or manage data, would have been to go through Google Account. “Now, we’re bringing these controls to you – from directly within Search, you can review or delete your Search activity and quickly get back to finding what you were searching for,” he said, adding that the company also was “providing quick access to the privacy controls in your Google Account that are most relevant as you use Search.”

Google’s privacy update came just a week after Ontario Privacy Commissioner Ann Cavoukian stepped down from smart city project spearheaded by Google’s Sidewalk Labs over privacy concerns.

“I felt I had no choice because I had been told by Sidewalk Labs that all of the data collected will be de-identified at source,” the Telegraph quoted Cavoukian in a Global News interview. "I imagined us creating a Smart City of Privacy, as opposed to a Smart City of Surveillance."

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