Google’s service that searches the dark web for leaked personal data is no longer exclusive to Google One subscribers and is being offered for free.
Since last year, paying subscribers have been able to ask Google if their personal information is for sale on the dark web. The monitoring service looks for phone numbers, physical addresses, and other data you’d rather not see online. Leaked data increases your chances of being targeted by phishing attacks. You can find the search results in your activity overview below. Results about you.
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No longer exclusive
Until now, the service has been paid, but that’s changing. Google believes everyone should know if their data is in the dark web, and it’s now making the service free. The company says this in one Short ad About Google One subscription. By the end of the month, all Google accounts should have access to the service.
This isn’t the first perk that has seen paying Google One subscribers disappear in a short period of time. On June 20, Google pulled the plug on the VPN service included with the subscription due to insufficient usage. We suspect that the disappearance of the dark web monitoring service’s exclusivity will also lead to Google One users canceling their subscriptions en masse.
The main reason for a paid Google subscription is basically to increase your cloud storage. With the subscription, you get at least 100GB, while free accounts should be enough for 15GB. For example, now that WhatsApp backups are included in your Google Drive storage, that 15GB will fill up faster than you think.
