8 ms·

Google photos is tracking my face and anyone else whose photos I have taken from my phone and I cannot turn this off. They enable a "search photos by people" fe

Google photos is tracking my face and anyone else whose photos I have taken from my phone and I cannot turn this off. They enable a "search photos by people" feature. I find this creepy and ominous. I never asked for this. Can I sue them for them to stop?

WilTimSon 7y ago
I would assume they have a clause about this in their user agreement, specifically because of this. Expect all big corporations to do the same soon and stop trusting them with photos because I don't think Facebook will turn the tide. This is likely going to be a one-off with other tech giants quickly patching the loopholes to make sure they can mine your data without any punishments. Not real ones, at least.
- toxicFork 7y ago
  Yeah... I will look for alternatives for photo storage now, what a shame.
  - mxuribe 7y ago
    You can always switch to NextCloud, and it comes with an added bonus of no longer needing dropbox, google drive, etc. for syncing files. HOWEVER, NextCloud is not "free"; you'd either have to pay a provider to host your NextCloud instance for you, or self-host (both options are cheap by the way, but not free like google's option).
    - WilTimSon 7y ago
      Well, can we really call Google's option free when it feeds off of our own data? I'd rather spend a few pounds a month on storage that isn't looking for ways to monetize me then save that cost and end up losing my privacy. What's more of a hassle is the setup since quite a few people will always choose Dropbox and Drive over taking the time to set up NextCloud.
drusepth 7y ago
You can choose to turn off this feature in settings: https://photos.google.com/settings https://photos.google.com/settings Screenshot of the relevant settings: https://i.imgur.com/Xg4wkPV.png https://i.imgur.com/Xg4wkPV.png According to their relevant help page about it (https://support.google.com/photos/answer/6128838?co=GENIE.Platform%3DAndroid&hl=en https://support.google.com/photos/answer/6128838?co=GENIE.Pl...), turning the setting off also deletes: - Face groups in your account - Face models used to create those face groups - Face labels you created
- toxicFork 7y ago
  Thank you, this works!

WilTimSon 7y ago

I would assume they have a clause about this in their user agreement, specifically because of this. Expect all big corporations to do the same soon and stop trusting them with photos because I don't think Facebook will turn the tide. This is likely going to be a one-off with other tech giants quickly patching the loopholes to make sure they can mine your data without any punishments. Not real ones, at least.

toxicFork 7y ago
Yeah... I will look for alternatives for photo storage now, what a shame.
- mxuribe 7y ago
  You can always switch to NextCloud, and it comes with an added bonus of no longer needing dropbox, google drive, etc. for syncing files. HOWEVER, NextCloud is not "free"; you'd either have to pay a provider to host your NextCloud instance for you, or self-host (both options are cheap by the way, but not free like google's option).
  - WilTimSon 7y ago
    Well, can we really call Google's option free when it feeds off of our own data? I'd rather spend a few pounds a month on storage that isn't looking for ways to monetize me then save that cost and end up losing my privacy. What's more of a hassle is the setup since quite a few people will always choose Dropbox and Drive over taking the time to set up NextCloud.

drusepth 7y ago

You can choose to turn off this feature in settings: https://photos.google.com/settings https://photos.google.com/settings Screenshot of the relevant settings: https://i.imgur.com/Xg4wkPV.png https://i.imgur.com/Xg4wkPV.png According to their relevant help page about it (https://support.google.com/photos/answer/6128838?co=GENIE.Platform%3DAndroid&hl=en https://support.google.com/photos/answer/6128838?co=GENIE.Pl...), turning the setting off also deletes: - Face groups in your account - Face models used to create those face groups - Face labels you created

toxicFork 7y ago
Thank you, this works!