Google Account Activity Feature Lets You Monitor Your Usage

Just several weeks after Google's controversial privacy policy changes went into effect on March 1, the company has announced the arrival of a new feature called Account Activity.

According to a March 28 blog post by product manager Andreas Tuerk, this new offering will send you a monthly password-protected report laying out information such as log-in, email, and web search activity -- essentially a collection of user data Google has stored and is now sharing across many of its services, a move that concerned some consumer groups and users.

According to The Verge, the new feature works with both regular Gmail accounts and Google Apps users with custom domain names.

Signing up for the Account Activity beta will allow you to easily track how you've been using your Google account. For example, you can view devices and locations where you've logged in, what browsers and/or platforms you've used to do so and what authentication changes may have been made to your account.

In addition, you'll be able to see the places you've visited and tracked through Google Latitude; stats and trends in the emails you've sent and received; and the types of searches you've conducted, along with your top queries.

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Active YouTube users who have linked to their Google accounts can view how many videos they've uploaded in a month, which of them was most popular, and a list of viewers' locations.

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What do you think of Google's new Account Activity feature? Let us know in the comments!