I read through the HN comments of this very same article from almost two years ago wondering whether the message of the article would have been interpreted any differently. It is really surprising how much negativity there is in today's comments as opposed to the older topic. In 2016 people were calling this article enjoyable and even "Their favorite Google-related article of the year". I found suggestions on how to…
I can think of several instances in the past two years that makes me mistrust them more, such as taking down accounts at random and taking a peron's entire digital life with it (causing me to move as much as possible off of Google), the random flagging of documents (aka, they actively scan them and will take off content they don't like), etc.
On the stock Android phone (I have a Nexus), it has felt that they have been trying actively to suck up as much data as possible (the final straw for me to put on a custom ROM is when their google keyboard sent everything I typed to thir servers, effectively making it a keylogger).
I personally think the skeptism they have now is very warrented, and the days "Don't be evil" is long gone.