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Google are a deeply, deeply unethical company and all of their employees are complicit. On a more practical note, I live in apartment above a restaurant. My phone now asks me to review this restaurant every time I come home and wants me to post photos I take in my apartment to the restaurant's map page. Now that OSM data is as good as Google and Maps.Me is a good enough client, my next phone will be completely de-Goo…
What are these "Google" notifications? Is that a "Google" app generating them? If so, can't it be disabled or uninstalled? I don't have this on my Android phone but I've uninstalled or disabled everything Google related. And if you don't want to be tracked, you can also switch off Location History.
Edit: Now it’s working. 12:20
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Or did OP hand over the data and not bother to go through the settings to turn off things they didn't like OP is making the case that they shouldn't have to. That a personal device they purchased outright should be secure by default.
It's secure. The data is only going to Google. OP agreed to that when he logged into the device with their Google account not when they bought the device. Also: security != privacy
Shocking.
The idea that you'd have any location privacy while carrying around a cell phone is absurd. Both iPhone and Android devices record location history, and your network provider always has a rough guess of where you are. It may be annoying that Google is very persistent about trying to build its maps dataset, but the suggestion that it's not happening on other devices is crazy.
Settings > Privacy > Location Services > System Services
Then turn off everything in the Product Improvement section, turn off Significant Locations and anything else in there you don't want.
Done
> We need some human help So pay me.
Disregarding the privacy issues, I find this to also be insanely annoying. I want notifications to be important. Not a bunch of spam that ultimately equates to advertising.
You can turn off these notifications in the Maps app. It's annoying they're on by default though.
I used to solve this by having an Android with a dedicated account, and logging the Hangouts app into my normal Google account, but that stopped working a couple of Android versions ago.
It feels like Google has a team dedicated to finding new and idiotic ways to make Android more annoying. The most recent annoyance I experienced was the "Welcome to [State]" announcement every time you're using Google Maps navigation and you cross a state line. Really, Google? You had to interrupt my music for that?
Things like that aren't universally liked or dis-liked, but I can see that for you it was way more annoying than it is for me.
Have you checked if you can turn it off?