Did you search for "pain" or "arthritis" or "migraine" or something like that? Visit a page devoted to your condition or symptoms? Could be whatever led you to get Voltaren in the first place also led you to issue search queries or visit sites in a way that let Google infer you might be interested in Voltaren.
Ask HN: I bought Voltaren at the chemist, now Google shows me ads for it. Why?
81–90 of 494 posts
Re: Ask HN: I bought Voltaren at the chemist, now Google shows me ads for it. Why?
#82Opt out of VISA marketing https://marketingreportoptout.visa.com/OPTOUT/request.do Second, disable GPS, and cellphone tower ID reporting (root needed.) So Google can't correlate you with sales records. At the moment, there is no way to disable Google AGPS spying on the stock Android. Third, block Google apps from reading your IMEI/IMSI/serial number, so they can't get AGPS data from your cellphone provider if it sell…
Instead of a list of instructions, it might be nice to have details on how all the things you mention actually work...
Re: Ask HN: I bought Voltaren at the chemist, now Google shows me ads for it. Why?
#83Because you aren't using an adblocker. Seriously, you should really consider uBlock Origin or similar. Google doesn't honor Do Not Track, so you should feel no obligation to honor their desire for you to look at their ads.
Re: Ask HN: I bought Voltaren at the chemist, now Google shows me ads for it. Why?
#84It might be that you are just noticing the ads now that you bought the product. I read about similar observations recently. Might be a cousin of frequency illusion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frequency_illusion?wprov=sfti1
It's been a few times now where I've talked with my wife about some new product (physically, in the room) and she starts seeing ads about it. I thought that was the explanation too, but it's happened too many times for comfort. I know my devices are (probably) not listening, but I can't explain it either. Neither of us searched for the product or saw it online or anything, we just discussed something and got ads abou…
It might not be your mobile devices listening. Alexa? Smart TV?
I've seen examples of this too, and it's downright creepy. At the same time, I love my Google Assistant. Yes, I know. I'm the product.
Re: Ask HN: I bought Voltaren at the chemist, now Google shows me ads for it. Why?
#85Earlier quoted context omitted.
>VISA marketing Why is this even a thing? Maybe I should just go back to buying everything with cash, it's impossible to keep up with all the crap we need to disable or hack around
> > Visa marketing I guess this is one of the things that just has to be forbidden by law.
In the UK there are data science groups at banks that target specifically extremely wealthy customers based on their transactions and balances. I think that they only focus on wealthy customers right now because they haven't scaled up properly but the plan is to eventually expand to everyone.
Re: Ask HN: I bought Voltaren at the chemist, now Google shows me ads for it. Why?
#86Earlier quoted context omitted.
>VISA marketing Why is this even a thing? Maybe I should just go back to buying everything with cash, it's impossible to keep up with all the crap we need to disable or hack around
Because credit card rewards aren’t free? Banks compete for credit card consumers by offering rewards. Those rewards cost them money. Selling consumer information is another revenue stream to make up for the cost of rewards. Most consumers are okay with this trade off: they get their airline miles / low interest / cash back in exchange for their purchase history.
>Because credit card rewards aren’t free
So this isn't covered by the 1-3% transaction fee the merchant pays every time you use your card?
>Most consumers are okay with this trade off
No they aren't. Most consumers aren't even aware they are paying with their privacy, so you cannot take a low opt-out rate to mean high levels of consent.
Re: Ask HN: I bought Voltaren at the chemist, now Google shows me ads for it. Why?
#87Earlier quoted context omitted.
Also google may read your email (if you are using gmail) - which contains your bank receipt (so seller), time and amount.
https://support.google.com/mail/answer/6603?hl=en > We will not scan or read your Gmail messages to show you ads.
No, they'll scan it for other reasons...
I don't trust Google. They are evil.
Re: Ask HN: I bought Voltaren at the chemist, now Google shows me ads for it. Why?
#88Earlier quoted context omitted.
> It's been a few times now where I've talked with my wife about some new product (physically, in the room) and she starts seeing ads about it. I thought that was the explanation too, but it's happened too many times for comfort. The wierdest instance of this is I told my wife her father should consider geting those fixed bridge dentures, next day I start seeing all-on-4 ads on the phone. I asked her if she looked it…
Yeah but neither of us had searched for that or anything, and I use DDG and uBO so it's not likely it'd be tracked.
A friend demonstrated me this with her Google Pixel. We talked for a bit about a very conspicuous topic in presence of the phone, and the Google app (which shows a news feed when you open it) started showing articles relevant to the topic within a few minutes. At that point I believed her that her phone is listening, though I didn’t make a big deal of it because she did not make an effort to configure her phone not to.
Re: Ask HN: I bought Voltaren at the chemist, now Google shows me ads for it. Why?
#89Earlier quoted context omitted.
They could always either compress the audio or do a speech to text (looking for keywords rather than caring about getting the whole context correct), and batch upload the results on an interval (like when checking for email or app/system updates).
That would still absolutely kill the battery.
Don't the latest designs, ARMv9, make provision for battery-efficient speech-recognition models "at the edge"? If it's not here yet it will be soon.
Re: Ask HN: I bought Voltaren at the chemist, now Google shows me ads for it. Why?
#90Earlier quoted context omitted.
>VISA marketing Why is this even a thing? Maybe I should just go back to buying everything with cash, it's impossible to keep up with all the crap we need to disable or hack around
> Why is this even a thing? Maybe I should just go back to buying everything with cash, it's impossible to keep up with all the crap we need to disable or hack around And some agencies may be more interested in these exclusion databases. So I don't think there is any way to get out of this maze. When you sign up to exclude from a list, you get included in many other.
What’s the risk here? Am I branded as a terrorist for opting out of marketing? What’s the logic?