Citation needed :)

I'm taking part in the Browser Fingerprinting Project that was on here recently[1] and the only browser that isn't marked in the test as trackable so far is Firefox[2]. They don't use cookies for the test so third-party cookie sandboxing or blocking is irrelevant. If Google doesn't use browser fingerprinting as you say then they really should fix Chrome.

1: https://browser-fingerprint.cs.fau.de

2: I test most mainstream browsers as I already had them installed on Windows and Android devices for testing.

They have admitted to using those sorts of information for fraud detection to detect fake ad clicks, bulk account creation, or other malicious activity. I also suspect they do some clustering on this data to determine what accounts are related so if there is malicious behavior from a cluster of accounts that appear to be the same user they can act on the whole cluster.

But there is no evidence that they use fingerprinting for targeting advertising.

They definitely cluster fingerprints to block whole groups as does any decent antibot.

(esoteric science/technical topics which wouldn't come up by chance)

The issue is that they can

But the danger is that he/she can. Thats why guns are regulated. Information is not a harmless dingus. Its a weapon, just as the gun was in the last century. Do we need a war to discover this?

The web is still a gunslinging wild west. We need regulation. EU is light years ahead in this regard and might just save us all from the tyranny of the Greay whom we trust to act in good faith - because they say they will. This strikes me as quite naive on our part.

What technical thing can achieve the goal you want? No metaphors.

This is a silly analogy, what is Google doing or planning to do with this information that is dangerous, and how does that stack up against the potential benefits of Google and other tech companies collecting this type of data?

That is not the right question because if a rogue US administration, that is, an administration willing to defy US courts and the US Constitution wanted Google's data, there is probably nothing Google could do to stop them from getting it.

(Such an administration could probably only get away with that during a time of national emergency, e.g., a war or a massive solar flare knocking out most of that nation's electricity for a month, but there are undemocratic elements in every country who are basically waiting for such national emergencies.)

At least I've never heard of a plan, from Google or anyone else, that would allow Google to successfully thwart, e.g., a surprise raid by thousands of US law-enforcement officers.

In other words, Google's data-collection practices are a menace (to US residents at least) even if we could be guaranteed that Google would never willingly use it in any bad way.

The law.

if you mean, cant stop you considering it, then thats fair, but then the point has no value?

Claiming laws only punish actions taken so they can't be "preventitive" by preventing others from taking those actions is either naive or just plain intellectually dishonest.

I'd really rather not see companies like Google (it any other, for that matter) making laws. Lobbying is bad enough.

You and all your friends are welcome to each bring an arbitration case against them if they have been doing it or if they do it without you agreeing to an updated privacy policy.

If they haven't, then you have nothing to complain about. If they change their privacy policies to allow it, then complain.