> "The Dragonfly memo reveals that a prototype of the censored search engine was being developed as an app for both Android and iOS devices, and would force users to sign in so they could use the service. The memo confirms, as The Intercept first reported last week, that users’ searches would be associated with their personal phone number. The memo adds that Chinese users’ movements would also be stored, along with the IP address of their device and links they clicked on."
This seems to be the direction for all users of Google. The new version of Chrome signs you into the browser even if you don't want to sign into the software itself. You can't really use Google's browsing device (Google Chrome) without providing your identity, if you ever want to sign into a Google website.
Support for Firefox is more important than ever.
I installed Chromium on Ubuntu today, and on the first run was given an opportunity to opt out from Google's personalized ads being shown to me based on my entire web browsing history. It was that moment when I realized, that what I had just installed was not primarily a web browser, but a Google application with a web browsing feature built-in. Because everything in it was built to optimize Google's ad revenue. It even had an ad blocker enabled by default, which made Google's ads stand out by disabling the ads by others.