blogpost 4# Tech Timeline

 

Nov 18th Edit was made to fix the format issue.

"Google it!" is something we've all heard and said but where did it all start and how has it affected our lives? The first search engine was known as Archie founded in 1990. Through the following years, more search engines have come and gone, Yahoo, AOL, etc. The one that became "the search engine" was Google. Google is now used worldwide except for a few countries that banned it. But how did it all start?

According to Google, Google started in 1995 in the dorm rooms of Larry Page and Sergey Brin. Three years later in 1998, Google Inc. was founded google later implemented Google Images in 2001, acquired what is now Blogger in 2003, Google Maps in 2005, acquired YouTube in 2006, and from there they keep on growing acquiring more companies like HTC and Nest. As of now, Google is 25 years old. In those 25 years, google has changed the world for the better and the worse. For one Google Drive has made Microsoft 365 obsolete with its cloud storage system. Gmail is now by far the most popular email provider.

But is this a good thing for one company to own so much? Obviously not, although it is useful to have one account for everything. If that account gets compromised it would be better. With Google having such a hold on what we do using smart devices it has a lot more data on us than we think. What did you look up 2 months ago? don't remember? Google knows. It knows everything you've looked up using its engine. How many YouTube videos you've watched, and how many Google docs you've created, if you use Google Maps it knows where you started and ended.

What can we do to protect ourselves from this mass data farming? Truthfully not much. But some small things can reduce the amount of data.

 1: Using a VPN(virtual private network) This protects you information from your ISP(internet service providor). It does this by encrypting your IP address. Overall it protects you but not from everything.

2: Turn off personalized ads. You can do this by going to your Google ad settings. Google will still get your data but it can be assumed it takes less.

3:Using non-Google products. for every Google product, there are multiple alternatives, the Google search engine, Duckduckgo and Bing, Google Maps/Waze, Apple Maps, etc.

4: Unplugging: This is more of a Joke but to have the least amount of your data taken use Google products as little as possible. However, in the modern age, This is almost impossible with most jobs requiring you to have some degree of technological literacy. Not using any form of smart technology is frowned upon and frankly for good reason. Although our data is being farmed by big tech companies there are ways to protect yourself and it is important to know how to use modern tech properly and safely.