Do Amazon and youtube share user data?

PerfectBlue97

I might be being totally paranoid, but I've noticed that some times when I search for things on Amazon I will find similar products or related TV shows on my Youtube recommendations.

For example, I might search for a T-shirt with a video game character on it on Amazon, and then find let's play videos for the same game recommended to me on Youtube. Even though I searched for the product on a PC and the recommendation came up on the Youtube app on my Tivo. So it's not cookies being read or something like that. And this seems to happen even if I'd only heard of the product that day and had never searched for it before.

For example, I could purchase the Frozen soundtrack on CD from Amazon, and the next day my Youtube feed recommends the video of Let it Go, or I accidentally click on an Amazon link to carpet underlay thinking that it's laminate underlay, and my Youtube feed would recommend demonstrating the difference between natural and synthetic fibre carpets.

Do these two companies share data, or is this just a total coincidence?

huxley

If you are not using tor or a vpn everything you do online is being used.

Shared

You might be surprised at just how much Amazon collect & who they share it with.

Google, Amazon present privacy concerns after Cambridge Analytica


Bear in mind that anything Youtube know, Google know.

PerfectBlue97

Yeah, but a lot of VPN companies monitorize your browsing by selling data on to marketing companies. Especially the cheap one. The only thing that most VPN are good for is stopping snooping when you are on public wifi, or getting round geo-blocked content.

They absolutely won't prevent any kind of data sharing when you are logged into an account with a data sharing company. No VPN will prevent Google from gathering your search history if you do a google search while logged in using your google account. The data is gathered directly. The same for companies like Amazon. If you're logged into your Amazon account then anything that you search for is recorded directly against that account, not over your internet connection.

PerfectBlue97

So, yeah, they definitely share data.

I searched for stuff on Amazon on one computer while logged into my Amazon account, and I'm getting related videos being recommended on my smart TV when I'm logged in using my Google account (totally different email address), but when I use the smart TV in another room that has never been logged in any account the recommendations are totally different, and are based on the usage history for that TV.

huxley

Using the internet is sharing what you are doing online, it goes hand in hand.

PerfectBlue97

That's not necessarily a good thing. Especially when you don't know what you're sharing, or who you're sharing it with.

Imagine if a store detective from one store were to watch what you put in your cart, and were to then report that on to the management of another store.

You'd consider that to be somewhat creepy, wouldn't you?

Google and Amazon are completely separate companies. I have nothing against YouTube recommending new videos based on my viewing habits. I think that it's a good function. I also have no problem with Amazon recommending me similar products to ones that I've browsed for previously. It's actually a really good way to find new books or music.

What I find disturbing is that companies are clearly selling my viewing habits to each other.

Right now it's somewhat harmless. I get things like light fittings and underlay.

Now, imagine that I'd been browsing Amazon underwear for my kids. Who knows what kind of YouTube video would have been recommended to me.

I know that it smells of nanny state, but I think that we need government intervention to force companies to tell us who they share our data with, so we can at least be informed.

For example, is Amazon selling information on what gardening tools I'm buying to an unethical  chemical company that makes weed killer? If I buy underwear online is this information being sold to a company that makes pornography? Does Peta buy data in people purchasing vegan products, or animal products? Are far right groups buying up data on people who subscribe to liberal magazines?

huxley

Privacy online is a myth.

PerfectBlue97

So is a world without racism. But that doesn't mean that we should all accept it if a shop puts up a "No (bad word for minorities)" sign in its window.

I accept that online privacy isn't really a thing, but at the very least companies should be forced to reveal how they violate your privacy so that we can choose how much of an invasion of privacy we consider acceptable. Abd boycott the companies that are too invasive.

We need the tools to enable us to put pressure on companies to change what they do.

We know that knowledge is vital because of the business with advertizers boycotting YouTube when they found out that their products were being advertised on extremist videos. When that information became available companies boycotted, and google was forced to act.

Right now we live in a world where somebody could search for videos about how to come out as gay. YouTube could sell that search result to a company that publishes anti-gay books, and that company could use the information to target advertizements so that people searching for LGBTQ  content would bring up anti-gay material. And the public could be totally unaware of it.

Going back on topic, I have no issue with a company that I use using my data to tailor their service to my needs, but I do take issue with them sharing that data without making clear that they are sharing it.