Edit your online visibility with Google About Me

Martin Brinkmann
Nov 11, 2015
Updated • Jan 4, 2018
Companies, Google
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1

Google's About Me page enables you to manage Google account information that are publicly available on the Internet.

Whenever you create a social media account, and sometimes others as well, you expose some information to the public.

While there is no guarantee that anyone else stumbles upon the information ever, it means that it is theoretically possible that it happens.

Public means that the contents get indexed by the social network site and third-party sites as well. If you use a search engine to find information about someone on the Internet, these public information may be returned.

Since that is not always desired, social networking sites provide you with options to manage what you reveal about yourself up to a point.

Google's About Me page makes this simple. All you need to do is visit https://aboutme.google.com/ in your browser of choice, sign in to your Google Account if you have not already, to see what others see about you.

google about me

The page lists among other things public contact information, work history, places, sites, gender, birthday and other personal information.

Next to each section is an edit button that you can click on to add, edit or remove information from it. For instance, you may quickly change the visibility of an email address displayed to the public, or add a new site that you contribute to.

The information provided are a reflection of what is shown on the Google Plus about page. While you may edit them on the page as well, it is not as straightforward as on the About Me page as it lists information visible to only the account owner as well on that page.

Plus, it seems easier to open the Google About Me url than the Google Plus url.

The About Me page links to the Privacy Checkup online tool which lets you review and adjust "what data Google uses to personalize your experience" and "update what information you share with friends or make public".

Here is a quick rundown of what it allows you to do:

  • Choose what Google+ profile information are shared with others.
  • Whether people with your phone number find you when they search for it.
  • Choose who can see your YouTube videos, likes, and subscriptions.
  • Choose whether to remove geo location information from photos you share.
  • Manage Google activity and history logging, e.g. location history.
  • Select whether you want ads based on interests.

Closing Words

Google's About Me page does not reinvent the wheel but it makes it easy to edit account information quickly on a single page.

Summary
Edit your online visibility with Google About Me
Article Name
Edit your online visibility with Google About Me
Description
Google's About Me page enables you to manage your Google account visibility on a single page.
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Comments

  1. The Dark Lady said on July 9, 2023 at 11:19 am
    Reply

    Martin, I would appreciate that you do not censor this post, as it’s informative writing.

    Onur, there is a misleading statement “[…] GIFs are animated images …”. No, obviously you don’t seem to have take much notice of what you were told back in March regarding; Graphics Interchange Format (GIF).

    For example, https://www.ghacks.net/2023/03/31/whats-gif-explanation-and-how-to-use-it/#comment-4562919 (if you had read my replies within that thread, you might have learnt something useful). I even mentioned, “GIF intrinsically supports animated images (GIF89a)”.

    You linked to said article, [Related: …] within this article, but have somehow failed to take onboard what support you were given by several more knowledgeable people.

    If you used AI to help write this article, it has failed miserably.

  2. KeZa said on August 17, 2023 at 5:58 pm
    Reply

    AI is stupid, and it will not get any better if we really know how this all works. Prove me wrong.. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4IYl1sTIOHI

  3. Database failure said on August 18, 2023 at 5:21 pm
    Reply

    Martin, [#comment-4569908] is only meant to be in: [https://www.ghacks.net/2023/07/09/how-to-send-gifs-on-iphone-two-different-ways/]. Whereas it appears duplicated in several recent random low-quality non relevant articles.

    Obviously it [#comment-4569908] was posted: 9 July 2023. Long before this thread even existed… your database is falling over. Those comments are supposed to have unique ID values. It shouldn’t be possible to duplicate the post ID, if the database had referential integrity.

  4. Howard Pearce said on August 25, 2023 at 12:24 pm
    Reply

    Don’t tell me!

    Ghacks wants the state to step in for STATE-MANDATED associations to save jobs!!!

    Bring in the dictatorship!!!

    And screw Rreedom of Association – too radical for Ghacks maybe

  5. Howard Allan Pearce said on September 7, 2023 at 9:13 am
    Reply

    GateKeeper ?

    That’s called “appointing” businesses to do the state’s dirty work!!!!!

    But the article says itself that those appointed were not happy – implying they had not choice!!!!!!

  6. owl said on September 7, 2023 at 9:50 am
    Reply

    @The Dark Lady,
    @KeZa,
    @Database failure,
    @Howard Pearce,
    @Howard Allan Pearce,

    Note: I replaced the quoted URI scheme: https:// with “>>” and posted.

    The current ghacks.net is owned by “Softonic International S.A.” (sold by Martin in October 2019), and due to the fate of M&A, ghacks.net has changed in quality.
    >> ghacks.net/2023/09/02/microsoft-is-removing-wordpad-from-windows/#comment-4573130
    Many Authors of bloggers and advertisers certified by Softonic have joined the site, and the site is full of articles aimed at advertising and clickbait.
    >> ghacks.net/2023/08/31/in-windows-11-the-line-between-legitimate-and-adware-becomes-increasingly-blurred/#comment-4573117
    As it stands, except for articles by Martin Brinkmann, Mike Turcotte, and Ashwin, they are low quality, unhelpful, and even vicious. It is better not to read those articles.
    How to display only articles by a specific author:
    Added line to My filters in uBlock Origin: ghacks.net##.hentry,.home-posts,.home-category-post:not(:has-text(/Martin Brinkmann|Mike Turcotte|Ashwin/))
    >> ghacks.net/2023/09/01/windows-11-development-overview-of-the-august-2023-changes/#comment-4573033

    By the way, if you use an RSS reader, you can track exactly where your comments are (I’m an iPad user, so I use “Feedly Classic”, but for Windows I prefer the desktop app “RSS Guard”).
    RSS Guard: Feed reader which supports RSS/ATOM/JSON and many web-based feed services.
    >> github.com/martinrotter/rssguard#readme

  7. Anonymous said on September 14, 2023 at 6:41 pm
    Reply

    We all live in digital surveillance glass houses under scrutiny of evil people because of people like Musk. It’s only fair that he takes his turn.

  8. Anonymous said on September 18, 2023 at 1:31 pm
    Reply

    “Operating systems will be required to let the user choose the browser, virtual assistant and search engine of their choice. Microsoft cannot force users to use Bing or Edge. Apple will have to open up its iOS operating system to allow third-party app stores, aka allow sideloading of apps. Google, on the other hand, will need to provide users with the ability to uninstall preloaded apps (bloatware) from Android devices. Online services will need to allow users to unsubscribe from their platform easily. Gatekeepers need to provide interoperability with third-parties that offer similar services.”

    Wonderful ! Let’s hope they’ll comply with that law more than they are doing with the GDPR.

  9. sean conner said on September 27, 2023 at 6:21 am
    Reply

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