Google Photos app has the function to back up and upload photos automatically from your Android phone via the sync feature. But users might not know that even after the Google Photos application is deleted, it automatically backs up users' photos, and continues to do so unless users manually change the settings.
Some users noticed that after deleting the Google Photos app and downloading it again several weeks later, all pictures taken in the interim are to be found stored in Google Photos, even if the app was no longer on his phone. Responding to these concerns, a blog post from Google explains that Google Photos app is supposed to automatically back up and sync your photos so users can have peace of mind that their pictures are safe.However, Google’s blog post does not mention what users need to do in order to stop Google from backing up photos. It is more than just uninstalling the Google Photos app.
David Arnott from the Nashville Business Journal has been trying to reach out to Google and clarify this issue. All he received back was just an email from a Google Photos’ customer representative stating that “The backup was as intended.” He was also told that in case that users of the app want to stop the automatically backing up of their photos by Google Photos app, even if the app has been deleted from their phones, they must first change some settings in Google Play Services.
We agree with Arnott on this issue: since the need to change settings in Google Play Services is not made clear by Google without someone to have to ask and no reasonable user of Google Photos app would expect their photos to ever end up on Google’s web site without their knowledge. This is an unacceptable infringement to users’ right to privacy. And this issue is coming out just after Google made many people angry with their recognition technology. This may make you ask how many of us have already been recorded and subjected now to Google’s recognition technology without our knowledge?
Even if it seems that the Google backup is not making publicly visible the recovered photos, this issue still makes some users of Google Photos uncomfortable about the fact that Google got them at all. As David Arnott from the Nashville Business Journal put it, it’s a deception to keep an app functional even after the user uninstalled it. And we tend to agree with him.
