Google's Search Data Storage Practice

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Mark Williams-Cook

Dec 10, 2024, 7:48 AM

Why does Google store a load of other peoples' searches in your browser local storage when you do a search?

Forwarded thread from another channel:

Ian Cappelletti

Dec 10, 2024, 7:51 AM

offset twiddler computation? personalization enrichment?

Mark Alves

Dec 10, 2024, 7:57 AM

Coming soon: inserting text ads there aimed at a technical audience

Ian Cappelletti

Dec 10, 2024, 8:00 AM

it has to be some sort of edge computation play

Mark Williams-Cook

Dec 10, 2024, 8:02 AM

Think it's related/trending

Valentin Pletzer

Dec 10, 2024, 8:10 AM

those look like the searches Google preloads when you click into an empty searchbar without previous searches

Valentin Pletzer

Dec 10, 2024, 8:10 AM

once you search something it’ll be filled with related searches to the one you just entered

Valentin Pletzer

Dec 10, 2024, 8:13 AM

<https://www.google.com/complete/search?q&cp=0&client=gws-wiz&xssi=t&gs_pcrt=2&hl=en&gl=UK&authuser=0>

Dave Smart

Dec 10, 2024, 8:22 AM

Yeah, looks like trending / interest. Here's something interesting, this is what I get for an incognito search for horses, like you some fairly random, possibly recent trending searches.

Valentin Pletzer

Dec 10, 2024, 8:22 AM

and I forgot about the “why”: It’s for performance reasons. Some kind of prefetching like this one: <https://github.com/twitter/typeahead.js/blob/master/doc/bloodhound.md#prefetch>

typeahead.js/doc/bloodhound.md at master · twitter/typeahead.js

typeahead.js is a fast and fully-featured autocomplete library - twitter/typeahead.js

Dave Smart

Dec 10, 2024, 8:23 AM

Then if I do a search for say google trends in a different tab in the same incognito instance, it updates it to probably related terms to that: (and some odd junk...)

Dave Smart

Dec 10, 2024, 8:31 AM

if an entry in the first array has a field with the key "zl" that seems to tie it to related searches, i.e. "zl": 90001, 90001 would be found as a key in the ag object:

        "ag": {
            "a": {
                "90000": [
                    "Related to recent searches",
                    "",
                    1,
                    1
                ],
                "90001": [
                    "",
                    1,
                    1,
                    8
                ]
            }
        },
        "av": "8506087685097493067",
        "q": "xlHEJVDc20SqCBStSVV9D6NT7uM"
    }```

Dave Smart

Dec 10, 2024, 8:32 AM

            "transformers rescue bots",
            46,
            [
                512,
                273,
                308,
                456,
                650,
                362
            ],
            {
                "lm": [],
                "zh": "Transformers: Rescue Bots",
                "zi": "American animated series",
                "zl": 90001,
                "zp": {
                    "gs_ssp": "eJzj4tLP1TdIz0pJzk4yYPSSKClKzCtOyy_KTS0qVihKLU4uTVVIyi8pBgD85w2t"
                },
                "zs": "data:image/jpeg;base64,{{truncated for sake of this thread"
            }
        ]```

Ian Cappelletti

Dec 10, 2024, 9:46 AM

performance reasons lol