Over the years, Google Now has become more accurate at taking orders. As it is, if you say to it: “Remind me to shut down the nuclear reactor in 30 minutes,” it doesn’t feign deafness and refuse to log your command. In fact, now you can whisper a command at Google Now in a rush hour traffic and it gets you fine.
That’s good news.
The bad news is; the thing is keeping all these searches.
We know Google keeps all our searches, – as in text on Google.com – but who knew they kept the voice recordings too. Actual voice recordings, people. It means users can listen back to their exact searches in the original way they composed it.
Why do they do this? Google says, this is so that Google Now’s neural network can better learn natural language. Basically, become better. But we know this is also one of the many ways Google tries to stock up on users’ data and use it to serve up targeted ads. (Hopefully not rat them out to the NSA.)
There is no knowing what else Google can do with these bits of recordings. So, it’s comforting that they can be deleted. To find your database of voice searches, go to your Voice and Audio and Activity page. You can listen back – which will be interesting – and delete them. Or, leave them on there if you are okay to trade your privacy for Google Now’s education.
