While tracking (and saving) all of your browsing history helps Google feed you relevant information and customized search results, as its ads in the New York City subway say, there are plenty of reasons you’d rather not have all your information aggregated by the big G. One big one: You simply don’t want the company collecting your web history for more opaque purposes. Luckily, you can stop it.Go to https://www.google.com/history. Click “Pause,” or go all the way, and choose “Remove All Web History.” Then click “Ok.”Now’s a good time to try to limit Google’s tracking abilities. Google is changing its privacy settings on March 1, at which point all the data Google’s collected from web searches — sensitive information like location, your favorite soft drink, age, orientation, religion, your favorite medicines and burning medical questions, your secret love for Skrillex -0 will be used by other of Google’s myriad products to “read” you, from YouTube to Google Plus and anything else in the house of Larry Page.But there’s an even bigger reason to disable your Web History: to keep Google from keeping your web data indefinitely. They’ll be storing it either way (and turning it over to law enforcement if they must), but if you disable, they’ll only be keeping it for 18 months, at which point it gets anonymized, at least partially.
The Electronic Frontier Foundation offers six other tips on protecting your privacy while searching around the web, from deleting cookies to using Tor. Though, beware: hide your tracks at an Internet cafe and you might raise suspicions, at least with the FBI. Which, if you pique its interest, can then ask Google for whatever data it does have on you.