The upcoming stable version of Google Chrome for desktop PCs and laptops will have a “Privacy Guide”, which will help the web browser’s users understand and implement privacy, safety, and online security settings. While Chrome has always had most of these settings, Google claims privacy and security controls should be easier to understand.
Privacy Guide is supposed to be a simplified, step-by-step guided tour of the existing privacy and security controls in Chrome. Google has developed the new guide at its Google Safety Engineering Center (GSEC). The primary intention behind this new guided approach to safety and privacy settings is to help users understand the “Why” behind each setting, explained Google in a blog post that announced the feature.
Each setting in the Privacy Guide will attempt to offer the reasoning behind the same, and how activating or deactivating the same will impact the browsing experience. The guided tour of privacy settings currently offers controls for cookies, history sync, Safe Browsing, and Make Searches and Browsing Better. Google has assured that it will add more settings and explanations based on feedback from users.
The current stable version of Google Chrome is 100.0.4896.75. Google has indicated that a new card for Privacy Guide in the “Privacy and security” tab in Chrome settings will appear in Chrome v100 or above in the coming weeks. This means the search giant could release a small incremental update to roll out the feature or include the same in Chrome v101.
The Privacy Guide will be available by clicking the three dots on the top-right corner of the browser window and going into Settings. Google has indicated that users can choose to leave the tour incomplete. Any changes that the user makes will be “saved along the way”.