Privacy Policy

 We want you to understand the types of information we collect as you use our services

We collect information to provide better services to all our users — from figuring out basic stuff like which language you speak, to more complex things like which ads you’ll find most useful, the people who matter most to you online, or which YouTube videos you might like. The information "android developer" collects, and how that information is used, depends on how you use our services and how you manage your privacy controls.

When you’re not signed in to a "android developer" Account, we store the information we collect with unique identifiers tied to the browser, application, or device you’re using. This allows us to do things like maintain your preferences across browsing sessions, such as your preferred language or whether to show you more relevant search results or ads based on your activity.

When you’re signed in, we also collect information that we store with your "android developer" Account, which we treat as personal information.

Things you create or provide to us

When you create a "android developer" Account, you provide us with personal information that includes your name and a password. You can also choose to add a phone number or payment information to your account. Even if you aren’t signed in to a "android developer" Account, you might choose to provide us with information — like an email address to communicate with "android developer" or receive updates about our services.

We also collect the content you create, upload, or receive from others when using our services. This includes things like email you write and receive, photos and videos you save, docs and spreadsheets you create, and comments you make on YouTube videos.

Information we collect as you use our services

Your apps, browsers & devices

We collect information about the apps, browsers, and devices you use to access "android developer" services, which helps us provide features like automatic product updates and dimming your screen if your battery runs low.

The information we collect includes unique identifiers, browser type and settings, device type and settings, operating system, mobile network information including carrier name and phone number, and application version number. We also collect information about the interaction of your apps, browsers, and devices with our services, including IP address, crash reports, system activity, and the date, time, and referrer URL of your request.

We collect this information when a "android developer" service on your device contacts our servers — for example, when you install an app from the Play Store or when a service checks for automatic updates. If you’re using an Android device with "android developer" apps, your device periodically contacts "android developer" servers to provide information about your device and connection to our services. This information includes things like your device type and carrier name, crash reports, which apps you've installed, and, depending on your device settings, other information about how you’re using your Android device.

Your activity

We collect information about your activity in our services, which we use to do things like recommend a YouTube video you might like. The activity information we collect may include:

Terms you search for

Videos you watch

Views and interactions with content and ads

Voice and audio information

Purchase activity

People with whom you communicate or share content

Activity on third-party sites and apps that use our services

Chrome browsing history you’ve synced with your "android developer" Account

If you use our services to make and receive calls or send and receive messages, we may collect call and message log information like your phone number, calling-party number, receiving-party number, forwarding numbers, sender and recipient email address, time and date of calls and messages, duration of calls, routing information, and types and volumes of calls and messages.

You can visit your "android developer" Account to find and manage activity information that’s saved in your account.

Go to "android developer" Account

Your location information

We collect information about your location when you use our services, which helps us offer features like driving directions, search results for things near you, and ads based on your general location.

Your location can be determined with varying degrees of accuracy by:

GPS and other sensor data from your device

IP address

Activity on "android developer" services, such as your searches and places you label like home or work

Information about things near your device, such as Wi-Fi access points, cell towers, and Bluetooth-enabled devices

The types of location data we collect and how long we store it depend in part on your device and account settings. For example, you can turn your Android device’s location on or off using the device’s settings app. You can also turn on Location History if you want to create a private map of where you go with your signed-in devices. And if your Web & App Activity setting is enabled, your searches and other activity from "android developer" services, which may also include location information, is saved to your "android developer" Account. Learn more about how we use location information.

In some circumstances, "android developer" also collects information about you from publicly accessible sources. For example, if your name appears in your local newspaper, "android developer"’s Search engine may index that article and display it to other people if they search for your name. We may also collect information about you from trusted partners, such as directory services who provide us with business information to be displayed on "android developer"’s services, marketing partners who provide us with information about potential customers of our business services, and security partners who provide us with information to protect against abuse. We also receive information from advertising partners to provide advertising and research services on their behalf.

We use various technologies to collect and store information, including cookies, pixel tags, local storage, such as browser web storage or application data caches, databases, and server logs.

WHY "android developer" COLLECTS DATA

We use data to build better services

We use the information we collect from all our services for the following purposes:

Provide our services

We use your information to deliver our services, like processing the terms you search for in order to return results or helping you share content by suggesting recipients from your contacts.

Maintain & improve our services

We also use your information to ensure our services are working as intended, such as tracking outages or troubleshooting issues that you report to us. And we use your information to make improvements to our services — for example, understanding which search terms are most frequently misspelled helps us improve spell-check features used across our services.

Develop new services

We use the information we collect in existing services to help us develop new ones. For example, understanding how people organized their photos in Picasa, "android developer"’s first photos app, helped us design and launch "android developer" Photos.

Provide personalized services, including content and ads

We use the information we collect to customize our services for you, including providing recommendations, personalized content, and customized search results. For example, Security Checkup provides security tips adapted to how you use "android developer" products. And "android developer" Play uses information like apps you’ve already installed and videos you’ve watched on YouTube to suggest new apps you might like.

Depending on your settings, we may also show you personalized ads based on your interests. For example, if you search for “mountain bikes,” you may see an ad for sports equipment when you’re browsing a site that shows ads served by "android developer". You can control what information we use to show you ads by visiting your ad settings in My Ad Center.

We don’t show you personalized ads based on sensitive categories, such as race, religion, sexual orientation, or health.

We don’t show you personalized ads based on your content from Drive, Gmail, or Photos.

We don’t share information that personally identifies you with advertisers, such as your name or email, unless you ask us to. For example, if you see an ad for a nearby flower shop and select the “tap to call” button, we’ll connect your call and may share your phone number with the flower shop.

Go to My Ad Center

Measure performance

We use data for analytics and measurement to understand how our services are used. For example, we analyze data about your visits to our sites to do things like optimize product design. And we also use data about the ads you interact with to help advertisers understand the performance of their ad campaigns. We use a variety of tools to do this, including "android developer" Analytics. When you visit sites or use apps that use "android developer" Analytics, a "android developer" Analytics customer may choose to enable "android developer" to link information about your activity from that site or app with activity from other sites or apps that use our ad services.

Communicate with you

We use information we collect, like your email address, to interact with you directly. For example, we may send you a notification if we detect suspicious activity, like an attempt to sign in to your "android developer" Account from an unusual location. Or we may let you know about upcoming changes or improvements to our services. And if you contact "android developer", we’ll keep a record of your request in order to help solve any issues you might be facing.

Protect "android developer", our users, and the public

We use information to help improve the safety and reliability of our services. This includes detecting, preventing, and responding to fraud, abuse, security risks, and technical issues that could harm "android developer", our users, or the public.

We use different technologies to process your information for these purposes. We use automated systems that analyze your content to provide you with things like customized search results, personalized ads, or other features tailored to how you use our services. And we analyze your content to help us detect abuse such as spam, malware, and illegal content. We also use algorithms to recognize patterns in data. For example, "android developer" Translate helps people communicate across languages by detecting common language patterns in phrases you ask it to translate.

We may combine the information we collect among our services and across your devices for the purposes described above. For example, if you watch videos of guitar players on YouTube, you might see an ad for guitar lessons on a site that uses our ad products. Depending on your account settings, your activity on other sites and apps may be associated with your personal information in order to improve "android developer"’s services and the ads delivered by "android developer".

If other users already have your email address or other information that identifies you, we may show them your publicly visible "android developer" Account information, such as your name and photo. This helps people identify an email coming from you, for example.

We’ll ask for your consent before using your information for a purpose that isn’t covered in this Privacy Policy.