By now, many people should be aware that the incognito mode in the Chrome browser does not live up to its promises. An internal chat by Google employees shows how ineffective the function really is.
Many people still use Google Chrome’s incognito mode in hopes of avoiding Internet surveillance. TECHBOOK has already reported how little protection the mode actually offers. An ongoing class action lawsuit in the United States accuses parent company Alphabet Inc. of promising privacy and still spying on users. A number of pieces of evidence have been released in the course of the lawsuit, including an internal chat by Google employees that is available to “Bloomberg”.
Incognito mode in Chrome compared to “Simpsons” character
The footage shows that even within Google, there is a lot of criticism for Chrome’s misleading incognito mode. In an internal chat by Google engineers in 2018, one person wrote: “We need to stop calling it incognito and the spy guy icon [Spion-Symbol, Anm. d. Red.] to use”. The icon of the spy disguised with a hat and glasses and the message “You’ve gone Incognito” would suggest to users that they are anonymous on the Internet – which is by no means the case .
Another person responded in the chat with a link to a character from the popular cartoon series The Simpsons. It refers to “Guy Incognito‘, a doppelganger of the main character Homer Simpson. The person wrote with a pinch of salt: “Regardless of the name, the incognito icon should always have been Guy Incognito. That also accurately describes the level of privacy it offers.”
Another email sent directly to Google and Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai also shows the frustration within the company. Marketing director Lorraine Twohill wrote in a bullet point that Google needs to make incognito mode truly private: “We are limited in how much we can market incognito because it [der Modus, Anm. d. Red.] is not really private. That requires really vague and evasive language, which is almost more damaging.”
Google is threatened with payments in the billions
The honest way Google employees talk about Chrome’s incognito mode could negatively impact the company’s chances of winning the lawsuit.
It is about compensation payments in the billions. A US court must now decide whether tens of thousands of Chrome users can collectively receive between $100 and $1,000 per data breach. Google rejects the demonstration. The company points out that in an incognito session, Chrome specifically warns that the activity is still visible to visited websites, employers and internet providers.
source
Bloomberg: Google’s ‘Incognito’ Mode Inspires Staff Jokes — and a Big Lawsuit (accessed October 13, 2022)