Yes you are missing something important. Once they've tied the browser ID to your personal account they can track you across all google properties, even the ones that you didn't log into.
Normally you would only expect to be identified and tracked when using Google services when logged in. The significance of this post is that they would be able to identify and track you across all your usage of that browser installation regardless of if you've logged out, or say in an incognito window.
It is based on the google tracking cookies, not being logged in. I don't have a google account, but I still see the house #s on firefox, until I flush their cookies.
So if I use Firefox and almost never encounter a website that uses a Google login then they aren't tracking me most of the time? It seems like they must have more tricks up their sleeve than that.
If you don't use any of Google's services which tie an account to you then they aren't tracking you. They are tracking a browser session and once that cookie expires the trail stops. Even if the cookie never expires, Google doesn't know who you are.
If I log in to my Google account once, they can associate that browser id with my account. Even if I log out, clear my cookies (and probably use the incognito mode), Google will be able to identify and follow me all over the Web.
I don't know about your PII thing, but it's personal data under the GDPR.
And Duck Duck Go's just-released study (https://spreadprivacy.com/google-filter-bubble-study/) shows that Google tracks you, not just DNT or not, but whether you are logged in or not, incognito or not, probably no matter what you do.
When Google recently silently made Chrome log you in whether you logged yourself in or not, I switched to a different (previously unused, non-Chrome) browser on a new computer, and without logging in to anything Google (but from the same house), I went to YouTube. It asked me to log in, but I didn't. It proceeded to suggest mainly links to very niche-interest, low-view-count videos I had previously in the past few days, making it clear that it had at least a very good guess who I was anyway.
Apparently, asking me to log in was mostly just asking for my permission for what they were going to do whether I agreed or not.
I still don't understand. When I log into gmail, it logs me into all Google services. If I am worried about being tracked, surely my first mistake is logging in in the first place? Or visiting in the first place? After all, even if I click "log out," I'm only trusting Google that they unlinked the browser state from the account. If I trust them to do that, I don't see why I shouldn't trust them to ignore this experiment flag from Chrome, or at least not use it for tracking. If I don't trust them to avoid using the experiment state, I don't really see how you can trust them for anything.
Anyway, if you're not building Chrome from source, then you have to trust that they aren't putting anything bad in it. And if you are building chrome from source, you can observe that they only send this experiment ID to certain domains, and they already know who you are on those domains anyway.
Just another way of saying that whether in the browser or mobile device and you're signed in to Google, any stuff you do that touches Google is being tracked.
The site[1] claims that every time you log into a Google property, like Gmail for example, Chrome will automatically sign the browser into your Google account for you, and that means that Google Chrome can track everything you do.
Does every Hacker News Chrome user know this? Are you OK with it?
Do the millions of non-technical Chrome users know this? Would they be OK with it if they knew?
As far as I know, Firefox doesn't do this. At least I hope so.
[1] Under the heading "Google Chrome Browser Login Scam"
If I keep my whole Google (https://myactivity.google.com) and Youtube history completely empty but still logged in to Google account everyday (gmail and youtube on Firefox), are they still tracking me around the web?
Your understanding is wrong. This is just an updated disclaimer that clarifies how it has always worked. Website owners have always had tricks to track you across sessions but Google is not granting itself any special privileges making this easier.
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