Privacy Practices & Protections - Google Safety Center
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Android
Android's ML-powered security guards against threats and protects privacy.
Gmail
Gmail blocks threats and keeps your messages encrypted.
Nest
Nest keeps your data private with built-in security and automatic updates.
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Assistant protects your privacy, and puts you in control of your data.
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Photos keeps your memories safe with built-in security and privacy tools.
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Chrome guards against threats with safety checks and real-time detection.
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Google One protects your expanded storage with industry-leading cloud security.
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Pixel keeps you safer both online and in the physical world.
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Family Link helps parents set digital boundaries for their families.
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Google Pay protects your payments and keeps your personal information safe.
Search
Google Search encrypts your searches, protects your data, and blocks threats.
Google Health
Google Health protects your health and wellness data and provides easy-to-use privacy settings.
Maps
Maps gives you privacy with Incognito mode and location history settings.
YouTube
YouTube protects your data with privacy tools and personalized viewing controls.
Gemini
Gemini blocks harmful content and provides easy access to your privacy settings.
Meet
Meet makes video calls safer with encryption and smart meeting management tools.
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Overview
Safer by Design
Learn how we're Safer by Design
Privacy
Privacy Practices
Discover how we build products that protect your privacy.
Ads & Data
Learn about our advertising principles and your ad experience.
Security
Built-in Security
Learn how built-in security keeps your personal information safe.
Scams & Fraud
Explore how we protect you from online scams and fraud.
Security Tips
Discover tools and tips to help keep you safe online.
Authentication
Learn about safer ways to sign in to your online accounts.
Cybersecurity
See how we lead cybersecurity in our approach and societal impact.
AI
AI & Safety
Learn about how we are advancing AI safety with testing and standards.
Secure AI Framework
Learn about the core elements of our secure AI framework (SAIF).
Content
Content Safety
Learn about our protections against harmful and illegal content.
Product Protections
Learn more about Product Protections
Android
Android's ML-powered security guards against threats and protects privacy.
Gmail
Gmail blocks threats and keeps your messages encrypted.
Nest
Nest keeps your data private with built-in security and automatic updates.
Assistant
Assistant protects your privacy, and puts you in control of your data.
Google Fi Wireless
Google Fi Wireless protects your connection for calls, streaming, and browsing.
Photos
Photos keeps your memories safe with built-in security and privacy tools.
Chrome
Chrome guards against threats with safety checks and real-time detection.
Google One
Google One protects your expanded storage with industry-leading cloud security.
Pixel
Pixel keeps you safer both online and in the physical world.
Family Link
Family Link helps parents set digital boundaries for their families.
Google Pay
Google Pay protects your payments and keeps your personal information safe.
Search
Google Search encrypts your searches, protects your data, and blocks threats.
Google Health
Google Health protects your health and wellness data and provides easy-to-use privacy settings.
Maps
Maps gives you privacy with Incognito mode and location history settings.
YouTube
YouTube protects your data with privacy tools and personalized viewing controls.
Gemini
Gemini blocks harmful content and provides easy access to your privacy settings.
Meet
Meet makes video calls safer with encryption and smart meeting management tools.
Safety Settings
Learn more about Safety Settings
Ad Settings
Learn about ad controls and how to customize your ad experiences.
Security Settings
Learn about security controls and how to add protection to your Google Account.
Privacy Settings
Learn about privacy controls and how to customize your data settings.
Parental Controls
Learn about parental controls and how to keep your family safer online.
Google Account
Safer by Design
Privacy Practices
Keeping your private information private
Data plays an important role in making the products and services you use every day more helpful. Strict policies, protocols, and privacy-preserving technologies ensure your data is respected and protected.
Privacy principles
Privacy technologies
Privacy innovations
OUR PRIVACY PRINCIPLES
Building products that are
private by design for everyone
We build products that are private by design and work for everyone. This means being thoughtful about the data we use, how we use it, and how we protect it.
These principles guide our products, our processes, and our people in keeping data private, safe and put you in control of your information.
We never sell your personal information to anyone.
We use data to make Google products helpful in moments that matter — like helping you find a nearby restaurant or a more fuel-efficient route home.
We also use data to serve more relevant ads. While these ads make it possible for us to offer products free of cost for everyone, it’s important to clarify that we never sell your personal information to anyone, including for ad purposes. It’s simply off limits.
We use data to make Google products helpful in moments that matter — like helping you find a nearby restaurant or a more fuel-efficient route home.
We also use data to serve more relevant ads. While these ads make it possible for us to offer products free of cost for everyone, it’s important to clarify that we never sell your personal information to anyone, including for ad purposes. It’s simply off limits.
We are transparent about what data we collect and why.
We want you to know what data we collect, how we use it, and why. Transparency is important, so we make this information easy to find and understand. This way, you can make informed decisions about how you use Google products.
We want you to know what data we collect, how we use it, and why. Transparency is important, so we make this information easy to find and understand. This way, you can make informed decisions about how you use Google products.
We make it easy for you to control your personal information.
This means you can easily choose the privacy settings that are right for you and can control the personal information you have shared with Google whenever you want — including reviewing your data, downloading and moving it to another service if you wish, or deleting it entirely.
This means you can easily choose the privacy settings that are right for you and can control the personal information you have shared with Google whenever you want — including reviewing your data, downloading and moving it to another service if you wish, or deleting it entirely.
We reduce the data we use to further protect your privacy.
We never use content you create and store in apps like Drive, Gmail, and Photos for advertising purposes, and we never use sensitive information like health, race, religion, or sexual orientation to tailor ads to you.
We also made auto-delete controls the default when you sign up for a Google Account, so that we regularly delete your online activity data tied to your Google Account, like things you've searched for and watched.
We never use content you create and store in apps like Drive, Gmail, and Photos for advertising purposes, and we never use sensitive information like health, race, religion, or sexual orientation to tailor ads to you.
We also made auto-delete controls the default when you sign up for a Google Account, so that we regularly delete your online activity data tied to your Google Account, like things you've searched for and watched.
We protect you by building products that are secure by default.
When you use our products, you trust us with your information, and it’s our job to do right by you. That’s why we use one of the most advanced security infrastructures in the world to protect your data.
Our products are designed to be secure by default, and we constantly strengthen our security measures to detect and protect against evolving online threats, like bad actors trying to steal your personal information, before they ever get to you.
When you use our products, you trust us with your information, and it’s our job to do right by you. That’s why we use one of the most advanced security infrastructures in the world to protect your data.
Our products are designed to be secure by default, and we constantly strengthen our security measures to detect and protect against evolving online threats, like bad actors trying to steal your personal information, before they ever get to you.
We build advanced privacy technologies and share them with others.
Keeping the internet open, private, and safe is at the core of everything we do. Your online safety shouldn’t stop with Google — it should extend to the whole internet. That’s why we continue to innovate privacy technologies and make them widely available. We share our learnings, experiences, and tools with partners, organizations, and competitors, because keeping the internet safe requires everyone to work together.
Keeping the internet open, private, and safe is at the core of everything we do. Your online safety shouldn’t stop with Google — it should extend to the whole internet. That’s why we continue to innovate privacy technologies and make them widely available. We share our learnings, experiences, and tools with partners, organizations, and competitors, because keeping the internet safe requires everyone to work together.
Your privacy is protected by responsible data practices
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Data minimization
Limiting the use of personal information
We believe that products should keep your information for only as long as it’s useful and helpful to you — whether that’s being able to find your favorite destinations in Maps or getting recommendations for what to watch on YouTube.
The first time you turn on Location History — which is off by default — your auto-delete option will be set to 18 months by default. Web & App Activity auto-delete will also default to 18 months for new accounts. This means your activity data will be automatically and continuously deleted after 18 months, rather than kept until you choose to delete it. You can always turn these settings off or change your auto-delete setting at any time.
Learn more
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Blocking access
We never sell your personal information, and give you controls over who has access
We are committed to protecting your data from third parties. That’s why it’s our strict policy to never sell your personal information to anyone. We don’t share information that personally identifies you with advertisers, such as your name or email, unless you ask us to. For example, if you see an ad for a nearby flower shop and select the Tap to Call button, we’ll connect your call and may share your phone number with the flower shop. If you’re using an Android device, we require third-party apps to ask for your permission to access certain types of data — like your photos, contacts, or location.
View our Privacy Policy
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Data transparency
Making it easy to view and delete your data
How you use our products and services is a personal choice that’s up to you. To help you make informed decisions about what data to save, share, or delete, we make it easy to understand what data is being collected and why.
For example, with Dashboard, you can see an overview of the Google products you use and the things you store, like your emails and photos. And with My Activity, it’s easy to see or delete data collected from your activity across Google services, including things you’ve searched, viewed, and watched.
Go to your Google Account
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Data portability
Empowering you to take your data with you
Every user should have access to the content they’ve shared with us — anytime and for any reason. That’s why we created Download Your Data — so you can download your photos, emails, contacts, and bookmarks. It’s your choice to make a copy of your data, back it up, or even move it to another service.
You are always in control of the data saved to your Google Account. Learn more here.
Go to Download Your Data
Privacy is core to how we build
our products
Rigorous privacy standards guide every stage of product development. Each product and feature adheres to these privacy standards, which are implemented through comprehensive privacy reviews.
Learn more in our Privacy Policy
Leading the way in responsible innovation
As new threats arise and user needs evolve, we are continuously innovating to automatically protect the private information of every user, at every risk level, across all our products.
Anonymization
Strengthening privacy protections through anonymization
We use leading anonymization techniques, like differential privacy, to gain insights from data without compromising the anonymity of our users. This allows us to create services that are more helpful. For example, in Google Maps you can see how busy a place will be before you go there, based on millions of anonymized data points.
Learn more
Federated Learning
Building helpful products with less data
Federated learning is a data-minimization technology pioneered at Google that brings machine learning (ML) intelligence right to your device. This new approach combines anonymized information from different devices to train ML models. Federated learning helps preserve your privacy by keeping as much personal information on your device as possible.
Learn more
Open-Source Privacy Technologies
Sharing our privacy protections and innovations
We are committed to constantly improving the privacy protections we offer and sharing these advancements with others. That’s why we open-source our advanced anonymization and data minimization technologies, like differential privacy, federated learning, and Private Join and Compute. It’s our hope that these open-source tools help produce insights that benefit everyone while still protecting individual privacy.
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We are committed to complying with applicable data-protection laws
We are always working to stay compliant with applicable privacy regulations. Over the years, we have worked closely with data-protection authorities around the world and have implemented strong privacy protections that reflect their guidance. And we continue to invest significantly to upgrade our systems and policies as privacy laws are enacted around the world.
Learn more
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