Topics essentially works like this: rather than using cookies to track people around the web and figure out their interests from the sites they visit and the apps they use, websites can ask Chrome directly, via its Topics JavaScript API, what sort of things the user is interested in, and then display ads based on that. Chrome picks these topics of interest from studying the user’s browser history.
Isn’t this completely immoral? They are literally stealing the users private browsing history and uses it to boost their own profits.
A user who uses Chrome is definitely providing Google with their browsing information. You can turn them all off (though some settings are very difficult to find and don’t have UI elements anymore) but that’s not how nornal people use Chrome.
With the topics API, Google doesn’t read shit. Your browser reads your browser’s history if you don’t visit Google’s websites, Google won’t know anything.
Google has clearly indicated their desires to kill third party cookies. Multiple times, that’s why they’ve spent years on FLoC and other mechanisms to provide ad companies with an alternative. These programmers don’t work for free, you know, especially the overpaid FAANG programmers.
You’re right that Google doesn’t have a special right to exist per se, but neither do you have a right to demand Google make a browser that suits your exact wishes. Google does what’s in the best interests of Google, and users do what’s in the best interest of users, and the two usually align. Any Chrome user can download Firefox if they don’t want Google’s code on their computer, or use Edge, or use Safari, or Konqueror, or whatever other browser you can come up with.
Google’s most expensive features are actually being put behind a pay wall (Youtube’s 4K and high bitrate 1080p video, Google Drive cloud storage, especially for business) and the internet is absolutely seething about it. It’s not just Google either, Netflix has decided to make everyone pay as well, and tons of apps and websites are now adding subscriptions to stay afloat.
Most people don’t give a fuck about their privacy if it means they get Youtube videos, messengers, social media, and apps for free. Everyone hates ads, but everyone hates paying for things more than they hate ads.
Fuck ads, use an ad blocker, problem solved.