Google Alarm from Jamie Dubs on Vimeo.
As most intelligent people know, Google dominates in the search field, as well as in online advertising — so they seem to be everywhere: in your search results, their ads on your favourite blogs, and probably 99% of websites that use tracking software use Google Analytics. So, how do we know if the website we’re on is allowing Google to track us?
This plugin, for Firefox and Chrome, helps you do just that. It alerts you every time your “personal info” is sent to Google’s servers. And surprising (or not so surprising) they do or could collect a lot of information about us. But, don’t anyone panic, yet. I don’t think they’re that evil. Or, at least, that’s what their famous informal motto is.
The plugin’s creator, Jamie Wilkinson, says, “Google makes great products and gives them all away for free, which has made them into a ubiquitous and omniscient force on the Internet. Google Alarm and F*ck Google in general are meant to illustrate how this single unregulated company now captures more information about us than any government agency ever could. When I started developing Google Alarm I was blown away to discover that 80+% of websites I visit have some kind of Google tracking bugs on them.”
How does the plugin work, exactly? According to Mr. Wilkinson, “[It] inspects each page you visit for Google-related URLs: googleanalytics.com/ga.js for Google Analytics, doubleclick.net/googlesyndication.com URLs for AdSense, youtube.com/v/ for YouTube embeds, and many more,” Wilkinson says. “Each service triggers an individual visual and audible alert to help you become more aware of when you’re transmitting data to Google.”
However, I know one thing for sure: this plugin’s obnoxiously annoying fire siren beep noise that sounds every time you hit a site that’s sending info, gets very annoying, very fast.
Just waiting on a Facebook Alarm plugin, now. With the gaining popularity of Facebook’s Like button, popping up everyone online, it’s no doubt that Facebook’s getting around like a slut.