Is Spotify selling user data to google?

[Papakocyk]

Hi all, 

I might sound a bit paranoid here. But I have noticed something really strange today. I have been chatting with my friend via voice channel in Discord. he has recommended a song to me. He didn't type the tilte or artist in the text chat, just told me what he would recommend. I have instantly search the artist in my Spotify desktop app. Few hours later My youtube feed has been updated with the same artist's song. I have never searched for similar music in any google's services before. So how would google suddenly get the idea? Only two options I can think of - Spotify is selling the search data, or Discord is using voice recognition and does the same [even more frightning]. Have anyone noticed something similar? I know, there is a paragraph 7 in the T&C, I get it, but still, I'm not happy to be "sold'... 

[valochelabrioch]

Actually I have just acquired today a firewall that allows me to minitor precisely all the connections going in and out of my computer from any given app, and when I opened the Spotify section, there was a whole bunch of Google services. So I think you might be right, that Spotify is sending Google user datas.

[rednblu]

Yep!

And that is only the tip of the iceberg!  But we love iceberg fields, right?  Majestic . . . .

[Rorey]

Hello everyone. Thanks for the info. To clarify, Spotify does not sell your search data to third parties. Be sure to read our Privacy Policy for the most comprehensive information about your relationship with us.

[Papakocyk]

Thanks for the answer Rorey. But it is a bit enigmatic don't you think? Do you think it is just a big coincidence, that exactly this artist appeared in my YT feed just hours after I looked him up on Spotify, despite never seeing this guy before? I think this kind of coincidence is highly unlikely. 

[valochelabrioch]

Thanks for the answer. As for myself I've never implied that you were selling anything, nor this was a bad thing, I think it's how the world works now anyways. But yeah I've blocked these connections between Spotify and Google and my workflow was in no way modified. As for the user terms, I'm sure there is the right explanation, but ain't nobody got time fo that.

[Papakocyk]

Exactly, I'm not complaining, I just want to understand what is happening with my usage data. 

[BamBoomByeBye]

I'll second this, I have just signed up to spotify premium family, and after a couple of days of using the App on my Mac I've started to see artists I've discovered via Spotify (and fridge artists at that, nothing near popular) showing up on Youtube in my feed. 

So forget what the privacy policy says, its **bleep** as there's clearly data leaking somewhere to google and despite what others say I'm not happy about it. If they are selling what we're listening too in a way that google can match it up then its also our profile data too. 

[mrmoly]

What is the firewall software that you are using?

[valochelabrioch]

The latest version of Little Snitch