A year ago, Google announced plans to save people's Location History, which it now calls Timeline, locally on devices rather than on its servers.

Google Timeline location purge causes collateral damage

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2024-12-13 23:30:07

A year ago, Google announced plans to save people's Location History, which it now calls Timeline, locally on devices rather than on its servers.

"This update gives people even more control over their data – and like before, they have the option to save it indefinitely if they want," a Google spokesperson told The Register.

Privacy advocates hailed the move as a way to address the proliferation of geofence warrants – law enforcement demands seeking location data for everyone within a given area during some period of time.

The privacy afforded by this transition is somewhat overstated, though, because turning Timeline/Location History off doesn't preclude Google's collection and storage of data that reveals the user's location directly or indirectly.

The company explains: "If settings like Web and App Activity are on but you turn off Location History or delete location data from Location History, your Google Account may still save location data as part of your use of other Google sites, apps, and services. This activity can include info about your location from your device's general area and IP address."