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Google Closes the Fitbit Acquisition, Pledges To Not Use Data For Ads (arstechnica.com) 59

Posted by BeauHD from the done-deal dept.
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Today Google's senior VP of Hardware, Rick Osterloh, announced Google has closed its acquisition of Fitbit. The $2.1 billion deal was announced back in November 2019, which kicked off a regulatory review process from governments around the world concerned about Google's influence over the Internet and the data it can collect on users. Normally, Osterloh announcing "Google has completed its acquisition of Fitbit, and I want to personally welcome this talented team to Google" would mean Google has cleared its worldwide regulatory gauntlet. Google's announcement today is highly unusual since the DOJ has not yet cleared the deal. As the US Department of Justice told New York Times reporter Cecilia Kang, "The Antitrust Division's investigation of Google's acquisition of Fitbit remains ongoing." Australian regulators also haven't announced a final decision on the merger. It also seems particularly provocative for Google to do something like this while it is also dealing with a DOJ antitrust investigation.

Fitbit's CEO, president, and co-founder, James Park, also has a blog post today, saying "many of the things you know and love about Fitbit will remain the same. We'll stay committed to doing what's right, to putting your health and wellness at the center of everything we do, and to offering a no-one-size-fits-all approach with choices that work across both Android and iOS." [...] Google's side of the story is laid out in the blog post, with Osterloh saying "This deal has always been about devices, not data, and we've been clear since the beginning that we will protect Fitbit users' privacy... Fitbit users' health and wellness data won't be used for Google ads and this data will be separated from other Google ads data." Google also says it won't do anything crazy with Android, like lock all Android phones exclusively to Fitbit wearables, which apparently was something the EU was worried about.
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Google Closes the Fitbit Acquisition, Pledges To Not Use Data For Ads More

Google Closes the Fitbit Acquisition, Pledges To Not Use Data For Ads

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  • How ? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by AlexHilbertRyan ( 7255798 ) on Thursday January 14, 2021 @06:42PM (#60945566)
    Everything google is about ads, whats the financial point otherwise ? Its not as if FB will actually make billions in selling devices.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Ascoo ( 447329 )

      Doesn't have to be about Ads directly. It could be used in filtering suggestions as in (if fitbit data says you're doing tons of exercise, maybe that will inform predictive models of what restaurants you'll likely want to visit later that night). Who knows. I don't own a fitbit, so I'm not sure what sort of user agreement they make you sign before creating an account/using the device, but I wouldn't be suprised if some form of health data (PII removed) is used to inform recommendations.

      • Google is an advertising company. I don't feel I need to be advertised to, so they offer nothing of value to me.

        • We're also geeks.
          I see nothing that Google can offer, that I want, that I cannot implement myself and better. (My personal e-mail spam filter, for example, is better than Gmail's.)

          • You can implement better search than Google? I will offer you $100/mo if you let me use it too.

            • Google search isnt good, after all what have you got to compare it against ? Its a bit like if you have only ever eatten North Korean prison camp food, and you think something they give you is great. The problem of course is your limited experience means you dont know any better.

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by rtb61 ( 674572 )

              I can't but these people can https://duckduckgo.com/?q=duck... [duckduckgo.com] escape evil and search wisely, I give this sound advice freely.

              Fitbit, the obvious target insurance companies. They wont advertise health insurance to you, they will inform the insurance company that pays them, to ensure to never ever get any advertising from them and of course any quote from them for insurance will have built in the risk factors Google has uncovered for them.

              Employment agencies can also get a pipeline into your health status,

      • Exactly its just another means to monitor people. Its hardly a shock G, got into the chrome book business, because they also want to monitor and spy on kids a major market segment.

    • What else?

      • Yeh you are right G, will make billions a year from selling FB devices, just like they have for the countless other hardware companies they have bought and closed down.

    • "Fitbit users' health and wellness data won't be used for Google ads" is a very narrow use of this intimate surveillance data.

      • You arent seeing the big picture. KNowing health and wellbeing of subject allows some real targetted ads. Maybe they will also track gps location and more again more ability to figure out items of interest for the subject and more exact ads.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      Well what does Apple do with health data and fitness tracking tech? Somehow they manage to monetize it without using it to target ads.

      Google actually has a substantial healthcare business already, but has fallen behind on the consumer side of things where the Apple Watch is for once a technically quite impressive product.

  • Ha! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by TuballoyThunder ( 534063 ) on Thursday January 14, 2021 @06:43PM (#60945570)
    Yeah, I totally believe that assertion. What's the half-life on Google pledges?

    • Approximately the time it takes to draft a PR release.

    • About as long as Facebook's pledge not to use WhatsApp users data, maybe?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by tlhIngan ( 30335 )

      What's the half-life on Google pledges?

      Anytime the stock goes down.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by samkass ( 174571 )

      Nest CEO Tony Fadell told The Verge.... While the founder wouldn’t say that Nest’s privacy policy would “never” change, he did maintain that “our privacy policy stays exactly our privacy policy, that doesn’t change” and that “at this point, there are no changes to our terms of service.”

  • Ok, my first thought is...they emailed me about this which reminded me that once upon a time I had a Fitbit or two.

    Now...I want to know how can I get Fitbit the company to completely, 101% erase any data they have on me before Google takes control.

  • I find that highly unlikely. When they got rid of the "Don't be evil" motto, they really took it to heart.
  • My wife just lost her Fitbit; we're taking it as a sign that maybe she shouldn't give Google access to her movements, phone calls (via the bluetooth forwarding to the device), sleep schedule etc. Google does not have your best interests in mind, so we can find another fitness tracker.

    • I use an OpenOffice spreadsheet, personally.

      • We were toying with an OpenOffice sheet to track a lot of things, but sleep is a tricky one for her right now. A teething infant means sleep is... intermittent. Filling out a spreadsheet at 3am is probably not going to happen XD

  • Why else did you buy them then, dear advertisement company?

    You mean not use it *now*. To make people swallow it.
    So you can actually get to their data later.
    . . . Because you did not say "never", now did you. And we all know that was on purpose.

  • It was never that good to start with, and now it's just another surveillance device. Into the e-waste bin it goes.

  • Is there a legal contract? Is there someone with standing to enforce it?
    If not a 'pledge' will only last until it is not in google best interest for monetization.

  • We all remember your pledges Google.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Que_Ball ( 44131 )
      But wasn't fitbit already on the evil list?  Remind me what they did for Pebble customers.

  • Google promised not to be evil once upon a time.

    I wonder if Google will keep this promise.

  • "Google Closes the Fitbit Acquisition, Pledges To Not Use Data For Ads"? Yeah, pull the other one, or I'll be walking crooked. Googol has made such assurances before, but the half-life of them has been about 6 months. Whatever Googol buys - EVERYTHING they buy - is devoted to their ad business.

    Once upon a time, their corporate motto was "Don't be evil". It's still the same, except for a few punctuation marks. Now it's "Don't. Be evil."

  • No doubt that's because Google has found far more nefarious uses for the data they're going to collect.

  • Just like WhatsApp and FB (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Pimpy ( 143938 ) on Thursday January 14, 2021 @08:19PM (#60945972)

    Same promises, with no repercussions when this turned out to be an obvious lie. While I would expect this kind of disregard for citizen data from US regulators, it's unfortunate to see the EU has apparently swallowed this nonsense too.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      Why would there be no repercussions? The EU has already fined Google when needed, and I'm sure they would again.

  • because he has some experience with acquisitions and not sharing data.

  • James Park, also has a blog post today, saying "many of the things you know and love about Fitbit will remain the same. We'll stay committed to doing what's right, to putting your health and wellness at the center of everything we do...

    I've read a couple papers that show that people who use fitness trackers tend to actually get a bit less exercise than people who workout without one. So are they going to quit selling them?

    Google's side of the story is laid out in the blog post, with Osterloh saying "This deal has always been about devices, not data, and we've been clear since the beginning that we will protect Fitbit users' privacy... Fitbit users' health and wellness data won't be used for Google ads and this data will be separated from other Google ads data."

    Cool. So what are they going to use the data for?

    • Cool. So what are they going to use the data for?

      Fighting disinformation that poses a threat to our democracy, duh.

  • I've got a bridge for sale. Cheap. Call me...
  • Pretty soon I will be able to open up google analytics and it will tell me who came to our site, from where, and what was their heart beat and calorie burn for the day.

  • ...for the first three months.

    There, fixed that for you.

  • All these companies "pledge" not to do something and do it anyway. How about we make it illegal to "pledge" something when it comes to privacy, a legal Yes or No, that's it.
  • I have already switched from Fit Bit to another tracker.

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