some additional distinctions in their operation and utilization — for instance, Waze can provide local gas price information — but the major highlight is that both are owned by Alphabet, with Waze being a subsidiary. This indicates that Google Maps and Waze share similarities in terms of data gathering and privacy, with all that data funneling to the same repository.
If you’re concerned about Google’s approach to data collection, it’s probable you’ll have similar concerns with Waze. This is something to take into account. As stated in the Waze privacy policy, hosted by Google support, the information you provide encompasses account details, usernames, phone numbers, residential and workplace addresses, along with other locations you save within the app, details about your vehicle, places you travel to, search terms, calendar information, and files uploaded to the service. Additionally, extra metadata concerning your device, browser, and application usage may also be gathered. Waze might gather information “about you from […] partners,” which includes, but is not limited to, unique advertising identifiers, local storage, browser web storage, app data caches, databases, and server logs. It’s not entirely transparent what details these data repositories hold, but it’s reasonable to infer that anything connected to Waze or Google’s services is likely collected.
