Google Chrome watches you

Today Google crossed the ultimate frontier of collecting individual data.

Google launched Chrome, a beautiful new web browser that computer users can download with a click for more stability navigating rich media on the web. But if you read the fine print of the user agreement, you'll note that Google retains a few interesting controls:

1. Google is not responsible if it deletes your data
2. It can reuse anything you communicate online almost anywhere
3. It will serve you ads based on "queries made through the Services"

This is fascinating because with one swift move Google has achieved what cable internet service providers have had to battle privacy advocates and congressional hearings over for years: Google can watch your every move on the internet. Cable companies have been beaten up over this issue; the fear was that allowing an ISP to track online behavior at the "box" level -- so-called deep-packet inspection of ALL the traffic flowing into the internet -- would be too serious an invasion of one's privacy. To date, online companies such as Google or Microsoft could only track you when you enter their subset of internet services.

No more. Google has achieved total vision. Combine the Chrome browser with the upcoming Android mobile phone software, and Google can connect your web use to your mobile movements. It could even conceivably do what comScore does now with volunteer research panels -- track keystroke patterns to distinguish different users who type on the same technological device.

This is not to say Google is wrong or right. We work in the ad industry and know that targeting offers based on data can be helpful to consumers and boost results for advertisers. But the sources of data have converged. Google, with its recent DoubleClick acquisition, controls 69% of all online advertising. With the back end of the internet almost locked, Google can now start mapping the data at every doorway coming in.

A lot of chatter about Chrome this week will revolve on its look, feel, or cartoon instruction manual. We'd be more interested in seeing the complete list of data collected by Google, like this old list here.