Google tracks all online purchases through Gmail

Google keeps track of all purchases made with a receipt email that has passed through Gmail: there is a special tool that shows a list of all purchased things that can be viewed in chronological order. Basically, every time something has been bought and the Mountain View giant has received a receipt through Gmail, the element has been added to the space mentioned above.

It goes without saying that the older the Gmail is, the more purchases have gone through the longer the page will be. Here is the direct link to the page called Google Purchases (Purchase) which will immediately open the list if you are already logged in with your Google account.

From a quick personal test, all the in-app purchases made on Google Play come out, but also orders placed on e-commerce sites, and the purchases made on the iTunes App Store are also saved.

Google responded to The Verge that the intent of this page is to “Help you easily view and track purchases, reservations and subscriptions in one space, we have created a list that is only visible to you. You can delete the information at any time, we will not use it in any case even to provide advertising”.

It is not clear how long this page is actually active for users, to cancel each purchase listed there is the handy command, but you will have to run one at a time.

Recently, controversies had emerged as third-party apps that derived data from Gmail content draw on MasterCard payment history for more targeted advertisements. But at the same time, Google had recently presented at Google I / O 2019 solutions for greater privacy such as the incognito mode on Google Maps and Google Search and new tools for controlling advertising tracking on Chrome.

One cornerstone of the upcoming Android Q operating system update is better and more transparent privacy and data deletion tools. Google also said earlier this month that it would soon let users auto-delete location, web, and app data collected across its products and services either after three or 18 months on a rolling basis.