Google Plus Your World: Opt Out of Google+ Feed Results in Google Search

Recently Google started including Google+ results in your search queries.  If you’re logged into Google+ your contact’s posts show in search results. Here’s how to opt out of this annoyance.

While Google claims this is private and enhances searches, I find it annoying and so does Twitter. According to an All Things D article, Twitter released a public statement denouncing the new feature.

Here’s the full Twitter Statement:

For years, people have relied on Google to deliver the most relevant results anytime they wanted to find something on the Internet.
Often, they want to know more about world events and breaking news. Twitter has emerged as a vital source of this real-time information, with more than 100 million users sending 250 million Tweets every day on virtually every topic. As we’ve seen time and time again, news breaks first on Twitter; as a result, Twitter accounts and Tweets are often the most relevant results.We’re concerned that as a result of Google’s changes, finding this information will be much harder for everyone. We think that’s bad for people, publishers, news organizations and Twitter users.

Personal Search Results

Here I’m logged into Google+ and did a search for Windows 8. Notice the personal results icon next to certain links. If you want more results, you can click the personal results link. Google calls this new feature Search Plus Your World.

Now you can browse through all of your Personal results. It includes what Google calls “personal results that are relevant”. it includes posts from people in your circles, shared photos and Picasa albums.

Opt Out

If you don’t want to see personal results, click the globe button at the top of the page to hide personal results.

Google says on its website this feature is private. “No one else will see your private content in their results unless you’ve shared it with them.”

If you find this feature annoying, turn it off. On the Google Search page, click the gear in the top right corner. Then select Search Settings.

Now, on the Search Settings page, scroll down and select Do Not Use Personal Results. Then make sure to click Save.

A verification message comes up letting you know your setting changes were successfully saved.

This turns off personal results from people in your circles, suggested connections or history. However, the button is still there when you search, and you’ll be able to see anything that someone has shared publicly.

If you don’t see personal results in your searches yet, hang tight, Google is rolling it out to users over the next few days.

If you don’t want to see these personal results while searching, the best option is to not log into Google. But for most users, this isn’t realistic. I imagine this isn’t the last word on what’s potentially a huge Google debacle. Stay tuned here on groovyPost for more.