Google adds tracking to Google docs documents?
Google adds tracking to Google docs documents?
Today I found out that google docs infects html exports with spyware, no scripts, but links in your document are replaced with invisible google tracking redirects. I was using their software because a friend wanted me to work with him on a google doc, he is a pretty big fan of their software, but we...
Title says it all. Somewhat interesting if true. I wouldn't be surprised either way.
The idea didn't have an evil origin.
There are scammers that are sending phishing links inside a Google docs drive as in this way it's less likely to get blocked by spam filters. Like "your statement is ready and you're eligible for a refund, click here to check"
By mass replacing all the links with a Google redirect, (it shows the original one but when you click it changes), Google now can block those scam domains
The side effect is that now the system can be used to collect all the visit stats. But maybe they're not tracking visits as they can already get full browser histories from Google chrome users with account sync, and that's enough data
Those aren't HTML exports though? Those are direct links to google docs.
First, scammers used to set up a Google docs with a survey inside Google for users to fill out. Google cracked down on those.
Then, scammers started adding external links to Google docs,so people would see the doc was on Google and trust to click on the link. Google cracked down on those.
Now, scammers are exporting the Google docs webpage and hosting it somewhere else, so it still looks like Google and makes people trust it, but outside of Google's control. Google is now cracking down on those by replacing every link with a redirect through Google,.so olevwn if the HTML export isnhosted somewhere else, Google gets to scan and block malicious links.
Personally I'm against it (tampering with user data) and I think it's only going to stop the scammers who forget to replace the exported links, which seem like an easy thing to do.
Not surprised at all and proved that Degoogle is not only a choice but necessity. I used have a lot of documents saved as Google docs. Feels much better now just using LibreOffice.
Do you have shared spreadsheets? I've been trying to find an alternative to Google Sheets, but I've not found one yet. Someone had suggested Disroot, but the spreadsheet doesn't work well with Android.
Spreadsheet is a difficult one. I do not have an alternative of a spreadsheet that can be actively edited by multiple people.
Instead I just go back to sending files which works well for most of the use cases. That is a trade off that I decided to make but understand that not everyone can make that trade off.