Yes. If there had to be a group of people to have access to so much data, I trust Googlers more than I trust my own government both in terms of ethics and definitely competence.

That said, I don't really trust them much either.

Google has existential power from their information and search. If they wanted to be a hedge fund, my god, they'd be very successful. Most elections these days are narrow, if they wanted to tilt the board in one direction, they absolutely could - which is a shocking thing to consider.

Imagine if you're French, and some massive foreign company could adjust their algorithm so that most of the news about Candidate A was good and Candidate B was bad.

Sometimes it's hard for Americans, in particular, to get the concept of such foreign control because nobody is 'big and powerful' enough to control the US.

But consider the analogy: everyone in the US uses Baidu. Everyone buys a lot from Alibaba. Most people read China Daily and watch films made and produced in China. Chinese stars are beloved and often more influential than local stars.

It's almost incomprehensible, but that's what it's like being in most countries in the world.

So you can argue about Verizon/AOL etc - but to people outside the US, it's a more existential concern.