They've also been asking for birthdays lately, obstensibly to verify age, but with the small print that it will also be used for ad targeting. But don't worry, they say, you can control how your information is used after you add it. On that page, the only option is whether to show the birthday publicly or not. There is no option to disable use for targeted advertising.

Oh yeah, and Google frames asking for a birthdate as being "in order to comply with the law". They are deliberately ambiguous in order to imply that it is me who could be breaking the law, rather than Google. Also, the law only requires verifying age, and doesn't require storing the birthdate afterwards. That one is entirely on Google.

So overall, my trust in anything that Google claims is rather low.

You may not like the bevahior, butlt there's no indication of dishonesty there. Quite the contrary.

If you are referring my my description, then there absolutely is dishonesty. The notice deliberately implies (1) that is is a legal requirement on me to provide a birthday, and (2) that I can disable the use of this information for ad targeting. Neither of these is the case. Therefore, dishonesty.

If you are referring to reading email for ad targeting, you are correct that dishonesty in one area doesn't necessarily imply dishonestly in another. However, it does mean that a person or entity loses the benefit of the doubt, and must have independent verification of their claims.

No, they'll scan it for other reasons...

I don't trust Google. They are evil.

What other reasons?

may be to build your profile (still not showing ads), but for potential future product like social network or video platform that will show you recommendations based on your profile.

Not like Google has been fined unprecedentedly large sums numerous times for deceiving users and abusing their info.

thats good to know but they don't say they don't read your messages (and keep your profile) for other reasons other than ads. I remember i got a message in google search saying you have purchased this product - not sure of the year, but they were clearly reading my mail then..[1]

[1] https://www.wsj.com/articles/google-to-stop-reading-users-em...

Amazon went from showing every item in order confirmation emails, to showing none. That tells me they don't believe Google's promises either.

Google isn't the only company that might read your email.

Also, hiding order info is a way to push you back to the store to engage in more Amazon ads.

That's great and all, but they literally used to.

Horseshit, they were 100% doing that.