While privacy perceptions and behaviors have been investigated in Western societies, little is known about these issues in non-Western societies. To bridge this gap, we interviewed 30 Google personal account holders in Saudi Arabia about their privacy perceptions (awareness, attitudes, preferences, and concerns) regarding the activity data that Google saves about them, as well as any steps they take to control Google's collection or use of this data. Our study focuses on Google's Activity Controls, which enable users to control whether, and how, Google saves their Web & App Activity, Location History, and YouTube History. Our results show that although most participants have some level of awareness about Google's data practices and the Activity Controls, many have only vague awareness, and the majority have not used the available controls. When participants viewed their saved activity data, many were surprised by what had been saved. While many participants find Google's use of their data to improve the services provided to them acceptable, the majority find the use of their data for ad purposes unacceptable. We observe that our Saudi participants exhibit similar trends and patterns in privacy awareness, attitudes, preferences, concerns, and behaviors to what has been found in studies in the US. However, our study is not a replication of any of the US studies, and further research is needed to directly compare US and Saudi participants. Our results emphasize the need for: 1) improved techniques to inform users about privacy settings during account sign-up, to remind users about their settings, and to raise awareness about privacy settings; 2) improved privacy setting interfaces to reduce the costs that deter many users from changing the settings; and 3) further research to explore privacy concerns in non-Western cultures.

翻译：虽然隐私认知与行为已在西方社会得到研究，但非西方社会中这些问题仍鲜为人知。为弥补这一空白，我们采访了沙特阿拉伯30位谷歌个人账户持有者，了解他们对谷歌所保存其活动数据的隐私认知（意识、态度、偏好与担忧），以及他们为控制谷歌收集或使用这些数据所采取的措施。本研究聚焦于谷歌的活动控件，这些控件使用户能够控制谷歌是否以及如何保存其网页与应用活动、位置记录和YouTube历史记录。结果显示，尽管多数参与者对谷歌的数据实践及活动控件有一定程度的了解，但许多人仅存在模糊认知，且大多数参与者尚未使用这些可用控件。当参与者查看被保存的活动数据时，许多人对其保存内容感到惊讶。虽然多数参与者认为谷歌利用其数据改善所提供服务是可以接受的，但多数参与者认为将数据用于广告目的不可接受。我们观察到，沙特参与者在隐私意识、态度、偏好、担忧及行为方面，与美国研究中的发现呈现出相似趋势与模式。然而，本研究并非对美国任何研究的重复，仍需进一步研究直接比较美国与沙特参与者。我们的结果强调了以下需求：1) 改进注册账户时向用户告知隐私设置的技术，提醒用户当前设置，并提升对隐私设置的认知；2) 优化隐私设置界面，降低阻碍许多用户修改设置的成本；3) 开展进一步研究，探索非西方文化中的隐私担忧。