> Given Google is already doing that (collecting anonymized data), wouldn't it be overall better if it also puts that to some good use?

Given Google is already doing surreptitious stuff and is generally anti-privacy, it ought to look at stop doing those first. Stealing from people and doing "good" with that is not an excuse for stealing, especially when most of the victims are common folk (even if one follows a Robin Hood principle).

Also, I didn't get the part about Google "collecting anonymized data". Google collects precise, personally identifiable data because that's what pays the bills for its chosen business model (similar to Facebook, which is far worse). Anonymization may happen down the line for certain purposes and anonymized data may be all that Google is able to get from certain sources.

No. Look at what's happening at a meta level and nonlinear effects. Yes, the social good projects will have some small positive effect in the world, but they also end up buying a lot of positive PR for Google, thus allowing them to continue their malpractices in their main business. Skepticism of the kind in this thread informs Google that their positive image right now is actually fragile, and that they should up their ante if they want to continue to be looked at as having a positive impact on the world, which is a critical advantage they use to gather the best talent.

The analogy for this comment is:

"The defendant is already doing that (committing crimes), wouldn't it be better if we permitted them to continue doing so as long as they're putting a portion of their spoils to good use?"

And don't forget to pat them on the back for their community service.

Even that is a very generous analogy, as it assumes that Google's AI contest will actually result in outcomes that produce some social benefit, rather than a few temporary initiatives that look good, provide near-zero real benefit to society, and really provide Google with technical AI innovations that are of some small use to their business.

You may not consider collecting "anonymised" data to be a bad thing, but you'll note that you inexplicably introduced the "anonymised" descriptor twisting the original commenter's "sensitive data"!?