When it comes to what information are on our phones and what could be done with them when others have access to them, some of us are more apprehensive than others.
Data brokers and advertisers have extensive knowledge about you. They can find out your secrets without having to listen.
The idea here is to give you some tips to protect yourself, since we all know that Big Tech enterprises don’t care about your security and privacy as much as they actually should.
Your Google account has an in-built stealth function of collecting audio records of your interactions with digital assistants, websites, and apps, among other things.
According to Google, their listening is just for the purpose of improving marketing campaigns. However, there might be even more serious issues resulting from this invasion of your privacy.
It could get much worse if a hacker gains access to your voice and audio recordings by hacking into your Google account or smart devices.
We are speaking of voice clones created by artificial intelligence that have the ability to access your private accounts, deceive your loved ones, or even worse.
Fortunately, there’s a solution for preventing such a disaster. This is how to stop Google from listening in.
Using digital ‘ear guards’.
Follow these steps on your device to ‘outsmart’ Google and safeguard your privacy.
◾ Open the Google app on your smartphone.
◾ Click “Manage Your Google Account” and select the “Data and Privacy”‘ tab, then scroll to “History Settings.”
◾ Select “Web & App activity”. You may notice a blue checkmark next to the “voice and audio activity” setting. Uncheck it.
And just like that, recordings from your conversations with Google Assistant, Google Search and Maps are no longer saved on your Google account.
And hence, they won’t be kept on Google’s servers.
Obviously, this won’t remove previously saved recordings. You’ll still need to remove that separately.
By deleting them one by one:
◾ Open your Google Account.
◾ Click “Data and Privacy”.
◾ Under “History Settings”, click “Web & App Activity”.
◾ Click “Manage activity” to review a list of your past activities. Any Item with a “mic icon” has a recording.
◾ Next to the item you want to delete, select “More”, then select “Delete”.
You could also delete all items at once:
◾ Open your Google Account.
◾ Click “Data and Privacy”.
◾ Under “History Settings” click “Web & App Activity”.
◾ Click “Manage activity” to review a list of your past activities. Items with a “mic icon” has a recording.
◾ Above your activity, click “Delete”, then “All time”. And follow the on-screen instructions.
Please bear in mind that you will be deleting everything connected to your Google account—including recordings—when you follow these steps, not just specific things.
Also apply “Do not disturb”:
Look for any more applications that may be listening in.
Let’s begin with the iPhone:
◾ Open Settings > Privacy & Security > Microphone.
◾ On the next screen, review the list of apps. Toggle the “switch off” to block an app from accessing your mic.
If you use an Android phone, Follow these steps:
◾ Swipe down from the top of the screen to get to “Settings”.
◾ Tap the gear icon > Privacy > Permission Manager.
◾Go over the list and turn off any app you wouldn’t want to use your mic.
And that’s it, with some little effort you can take away a huge concern from off your chest!
