They’ve re-defined privacy to mean “hidden to everyone but google” as in, “google knows everything about me and does a really good job of keeping that information secure”.

Apple has been doing this for a long time. iPhones don't track their users any less than android phones, they just let less of it out of Apple's grasp.

I'm very quickly becoming old and weird for clinging to the belief that no one, including google, should know anything about me other than things I explicitly tell them, and they should only use those things for purposes I explicitly permit.

That's very sensible.

Every form field needs a "None of your business." option.

Including marriage forms and birth certificates.

Gen Y often talk about “responsible ads”. Or threads about “devs need to get paid (through intrusive ad platforms)”. It’s… exasperating. I got a notification on my Android phone to configure topic reporting for apps a few days ago.

I've been lectured about "stealing" content by not subjecting myself to ads, like what? The corporate brainwashing is real.

They've re-defined privacy to mean "hidden to everyone but google" as in, "google knows everything about me and does a really good job of keeping that information secure".

Worst part is, they've pulled that stunt with "security" before. Confidentiality is one of three core principles of information security. Privacy is that applied for personal information. Logically, privacy is an important field underneath information security.

But thanks to Google's messaging, you've got infosec folks saying shit like Chrome being the most secure browser. Its sync isn't even end-to-end-encrypted by default, because Google would rather not close off access to your data. You could only consider Chrome secure, if you're ignoring Google as an attacker.