Why does Google store search engine logs data?
We store this data for a number of reasons, the most important of which are to improve our search results and to maintain the security of our systems. Analyzing logs data is an important tool in helping our engineers refine search quality and build helpful new services. Take the example of Google Spell Checker. Google’s spell checking software automatically looks at a user’s query and checks to see if that user is using the most common version of the word’s spelling. If we calculate that a user is likely to get more relevant search results with an alternative spelling, we’ll ask “Did you mean: (more common spelling)?” In order to provide this service, we study the data in our logs. Logs data also helps us improve our search results. If we know that users are clicking on the #1 result, we know we’re probably doing something right, and if they’re hitting next page or reformulating their query, we’re probably doing something wrong. In addition, logs data helps us prevent against fraud and
