In a policy revision announced this week, Google will be instituting one blanket privacy policy across their many web products with the reasoning that they're building a streamlined user experience. The data from your activity and habits on one Google-owned site will be stored in their servers and shared across all their sites. The legal speak details for Google's new Terms of Service are available on their website, but we've broken down what you need to know and how the changes affect your digital life below.

• When logged into any Google product account, the personal information provided will be shared among all of Google's products. Searches and text provided in Google Search may pop back up in YouTube as recommended videos or Gmail as targeted ads.
• Those ads across Google services will be more finely targeted than ever, thanks to your activity across the company's network of products, after all the servers see your most visited websites on Chrome and your recurring destinations on Maps. If personalized ads aren't for you, the function can be turned off with the Ads Preference Manager.
• Google says your data privacy is secure. They will not sell your personal information or share it without permission, unless with a valid court order.
• Google social search elements are still happening. When applicable, Google+ personal results will continue to appear in a search query, with the thinking that a friend's recommendation or recent article share on the social network ties closer to what you're scouring the Internet for.
• The Google products policy change goes into effect March 1.

Tell us your feelings on the Internet giant's changes in the comments and watch Google's video explanation of the new policy after the break.

Visiting your family over the holidays is a joyous occasion . . . even if you do spend half of your time setting up your parents' WiFi, teaching them about Twitter, and schooling them on the ins and outs of Facebook. Fact is, Facebook is filled with hackers just waiting to get their hands on your parent's information in order to spam their friends, or worse — get a hold of their private info to aid in identity theft. Help your parents stay on the safe side by emphasizing these safety and privacy rules on Facebook.

Privacy Controls

Walk your parents through Facebook's new privacy controls so they can keep private information on lockdown, and to learn how they can decide which of their friends, colleagues, and acquaintances sees which posts.

Backing Up Their Data

Just in case their Facebook accounts are compromised, or to keep copies of their many Facebook pics, help your parents figure out how to back up their Facebook data just in case.

Removing Contact Phone Numbers

Did you know that when you connect your Facebook account with mobile Facebook, all of your phone contact phone numbers are automatically imported into your Facebook account? Teach your parents how to clear out those numbers and spread the word so their friends can do the same.

Suspicious Links and Status Updates

You know your friends, and should have an inkling as to what kind of links they share on Facebook. If one of your friends posts a status update that says something along the lines of "OMG This is so amazing! Click here!" or "There's a rumor going around about you. Click here to see what it is," it's probably spam. Additionally, if you see the same message popping up on multiple friends' accounts, do not click it. It could turn your account into a spamming machine.

Change Passwords Often

If your parents have one password for multiple accounts and websites, it's your duty to alert them to the dangers of this practice. Help them create hacker-proof passwords for each of their online accounts so if one site gets hacked, the perpetrators won't be able to then sign into your parents' online banking, credit cards, and email accounts, keeping the possibility of identity theft to a minimum.

What Not to Post

Even though your parents enjoy sharing information about their daily lives with their friends, there are some things you shouldn't post on Facebook. Most importantly, a public status update explaining that they're out of town for an extended period of time. Sharing these deets with close friends only is fine, but announcing to the world that their house will be empty for the next week is a no-no.

While most social networks offer enhanced privacy settings, which will allow you to keep your profiles private, there are a handful of things you can do to make your accounts less accessible and susceptible to searches made by your new guy's ex or an old friend you don't want to have to ignore online. Check out these tips on staying private online.

• Create an Alternate Email Address For Account Sign-Up — If you don't want to be found, sign up for your social networking sites — from Flickr, Facebook, and Twitter — with a secondary or alternate email address so when people search for you based on the email in their contact list, they don't find you immediately. This will allow you more control of who can see your profiles. If your accounts are already set up, change the default email to a new one to prevent any new snoops. You may also consider using one email account when you sign up for sites in an effort to keep your social networking organized.
• Disable All GPS/Locator Apps and Settings — Don't want people to know you're tweeting from the coffee shop around the corner from your ex's at 9 a.m., on Sunday? Don't tweet with your location enabled, and don't sign up for Google Latitude, which will allow friends insight into your locale.
• Go Invisible or Block and Group People You Don't Want to Talk To — Don't want to see your boss on Gchat every time you sign on, or don't want your ex's ex to be able to see your Facebook profile? Play with your settings! AIM, Gchat, and any major chat client will allow you to make yourself invisible or block a specific list of people. Check out Facebook's guide to blocking people for support. You can also use friend lists on Facebook to control how much certain or all friends see.

See the rest of the tips after the break.

Facebook has had some issues with privacy in the past, and this week a new privacy issue was discovered: Facebook can track you across the web, even if you're logged out of your account. At the basic level, your web browser contains cookies from Facebook that remember your log-in info, but there are more. The company has removed one cookie that reported your user ID until you shut down your browser (essentially tracking your movements across the web), but other cookies, which still allow Facebook to track data like failed log-in attempts, hackers, spammers, language, and log-in times and identify computers in Internet cafés, remain.

If you would rather Facebook not track your data across the web, there are a few things you can do:

For Chrome

• Browse in an incognito window — Chrome offers the ability to open an "incognito window," which allows you to browse in private. Download and browsing histories are not saved, and new cookies are deleted as soon as you shut the window.
• Install Facebook Disconnect — This Chrome extension blocks all traffic from third-party sites (the ones that are using the Like button and Facebook Connect) to Facebook servers but will still let you access the Facebook website itself.

For Other Browsers

• Download Disconnect.me — This app disables third-party tracking and shows blocked requests for installing cookies. This app is available for Chrome, Firefox, and Safari.
• Manually clear your Facebook cookies after every Facebook session.

Submitting to a background and credit check when accepting a job is nothing new. But what about giving permission for a social media background check? Companies have long informally checked out prospects' public profiles, and we've heard of those cases where an employee was fired for posting inappropriate content to Facebook.

Introducing the next digital step in the hiring process: Social Intelligence, a social media background screening service designed to give employers a glimpse of the "real" side of job candidates. Of course, much of this information can be gathered manually by the HR department using a basic Google search. Social Intelligence removes any information deemed illegal for a company to consider when hiring, and will store social media findings for seven years per prospective employer company. While one company may dismiss you for scandalous Facebook photos, if you remove any damaging information from the Internet, a new employer would not be able to access those old, embarrassing updates. Click through to learn which social media details can be provided to the hiring company.