TheLowestStone

If there’s no method of exploitation then you haven’t found a vulnerability. You’re just describing how the system works.

So name one…

Ok, cool. You successfully proved that a person you suspect of being nosy actually is. You probably could have figured that out based on their reaction to you telling them about the fake arrest. Also, your nosy fake friend is a real idiot. They are apparently privacy focused enough to be using Leta but ignorant of the fact that this search is going to be cached and the time logged. The arrest is from 2006 so it’s unlikely anyone else would have searched it. Leta isn’t widely used so the smart play is to use literally any other search engine for this one search because the only person they need to keep it a secret from is you. Or maybe they just don’t care if you know that they searched for more info on your arrest because everyone already knows they are nosy.

All of this is besides the point though because none of these super specific scenarios are what we’re talking about when we discuss privacy on this level. This is meant for keeping Google from harvesting your data. If you decide to use it for baiting people into searching specific things so you can have a weird little gotcha moment that’s on you.

Unless the terms include a name or location.

This is somewhat valid but it still doesn’t really tell you anything about who searched for that thing. You only know that someone else searched for it and how long ago it happened. You have no idea who they are, where they are, or why they entered that search term.

Suppose you tell someone in secret that you were arrested. You know they use Leta, so you look up “John Doe arrest” later and see that it was just recently cached. You only told one person so it must have been them. You now know what someone searched because they used Leta.

No, you don’t know that. You are assuming it.

You don’t have a comprehensive list of Leta users and you aren’t the only person who knows about your arrest. There’s at very least the cops, whatever support staff they have around at the time, and anyone they talked to. Then there’s any witnesses to the arrest, everyone who could have seen you in the back of a cop car, and everyone they talked to. Even if you were somehow arrested and processed by a single officer in total secret and then he killed himself in front of you before he could tell anyone else, there’s still the possibility that your friend betrayed your confidence and told other people about your arrest.

I do like it because when I’m trying to find out more information about break8ng events I want to know if I’m getting outdated information. Also, knowing that someone, somewhere in the world entered the same search terms as you within the last 30 days tells you absolutely nothing about that person.