This is just a quick post regarding Google. After mourning the passing of latitude and spending a long time looking for alternatives especially in light of trying to find apps to help me locate my phone (post coming in due course). I was gobsmacked to find that Google is now launching this service: “Android Device Manager”!

According to the help:

If you lose your Android device associated with your Google Account, you can use Android Device Manager to remotely locate and factory reset your phone or tablet.

Well that does help sort out some of the tracking features missing from latitude and ease the smug face annoyance of the iphone people who had paid, then got this service for free. Whilst use latitude users had it for free then taken from use ever so cruelly.

The question is do I still want to keep giving Google my location data? I’m not certain - perhaps I want a 3rd party from a neutral country to have my location data even if this does mean I have to pay for the “Track and Trace” type features.

With that said Google does state:

****Important:** Android Device Manager doesn’t collect a location history or do background location reporting. Your device’s approximate location is requested when you first sign in, and this location data is deleted when you sign out of the device manager. If the device is turned off or offline, Google is unable to report its location.**

So perhaps I will use it? But from experience in order to share your location information with one Google product Google requests that you allow all its products the same access. Or I thought it did - I will double check that.

Either way I guess I am like many Google users questioning my continued loyalty to their “Do no evil” approach to commerce. With the recent NSA and GCHQ revelations, the closure/termination of many services with little to no warning I am now always looking for alternative products often outside the USA as a preference and even outside the UK where I can. I have nothing to hide but I’m annoyed that perhaps having another set of organisations/people looking at my information means potentially another method for my personal information being left on a laptop in a pub, or printed out and left on a tube station or similar security breach.