Is the Google Toolbar Tracking Your Browsing Even When You Tell it Not to?

Posted 01/26/2010 at 2:41pm | by Bart Salisbury

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No means no, except when Google decides it doesn’t? This might be the case, according to Benjamin Edelman, who says that Google’s Toolbar not only tracks your every browsing move when you’ve authorized it to, but it also continues to track you when you tell it not to.

Edelman tells us that when enhanced features are enabled in the Google Toolbar, the URL for all websites visited are sent to Google. In return, Google adds some additional information, such as “PageRank”, “Related Sites”, and “Sidewiki” to the Toolbar. That’s to be expected.

But, when the “Disable Google Toolbar only for this window” option is selected, or if the Google Toolbar is disabled using the “Manage Add-Ons” option, URLs are still sent to Google for processing. Google acknowledges this, but says that URLs are no longer sent after the browser is reset. Edelman points out this requirement is meaningless for the first scenario, and that Google provides no warning of the necessity of a reset for the second.

Turning off the Toolbar’s enhanced features is an option, but Edelman says that Google designed the Toolbar like the “Hotel California”. Edelman writes, “disabling Enhanced Features seems to require uninstalling Google Toolbar altogether, and in any event disabling Enhanced Features certainly lacks any comparably-quick command.”

Lesson here: If you don’t want to be tracked, don’t let it happen in the first place. And if you disable it later, be sure to restart your browser before continuing.

Image Credit: Benjamin Edelman