Privacy is a thing of the past, that is not secret. The best you can do these days is make it a little more difficult for some information to be found but sometimes even that proves to be difficult.
This story started when I resold my Nexus 7 a few months back. I had had the device for a couple of months, and while I loved the form factor and size, the Android platform has never been comparable to iOS in my opinion. But that is another story. Anyways…..I sold the device though Kajiji, and I agreed to meet the person I sold it to at a location and exchange the device for the money. The device was packed with all of its original factory material and boxing, and even provided a copy of the receipt with my personal info blacked out. At this point, all we knew about each other was our email addresses which was great. I have a Yahoo email address just for situations like this.
Now, a few months later, the device is not working like it should and the person I sold it to needs to get it fixed under warranty (since its still less than a year old). And this is where our troubles begin. Google does not provide warranty service to items purchased from the Play Store unless you have the original purchaser’s Name, email, and address….which means the anonymous transaction that we had had is now have to be a lot more personal.
None of this info is really that hard to find with a few searches on the internet, but that is besides the point. I fail to see why this level of information is required. All you have to provide really should be the order number and the rest of the information can be looked up on Google’s side. If Google is concerned with theft, they can always send an email to the original purchaser to verify any other information.
Moral of the story: Until Google fixes this big security hole, think twice before purchasing directly from the Play store.
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