"To name a few practices, Google can track search queries over time, target ads to its Gmail users based on the contents of e-mails, and use a person's location

"To name a few practices, Google can track search queries over time, target ads to its Gmail users based on the contents of e-mails, and use a person's location data to determine which shops' ads it will show." Not only are they common knowledge (not just in the tech community but even known by people such as my mother, who's extent of computer abilities is being able to use Skype/Gmail/Google), but it's often easy to notice even with no technical knowledge at all, just by looking at what the adverts actually are. Seems odd, even if he never worked directly in that area, or cared much about privacy, that he never knew that kind of stuff. (Or possible he's talking on levels way and above, and the writer of the article was just listing the most basic examples for readers.)