Google may soon pay you to monitor your mobile app usage (report)

For Google and Facebook, the race is on to figure out exactly how we use our mobile devices.

Following Facebook’s announcement that it bought Onavo, whose technology could give it deep insights into user app habits, now Engadget is reporting that Google may be working on a similar service dubbed “Mobile Meter.”

Just like Onavo, Mobile Meter would enable Google to track your mobile data usage and send other information (like how long you’ve used an app, and how often you open specific apps) back to the company’s servers. Since Onavo positions itself as a mobile data compression service, its users are trading lower mobile data bills for their app usage statistics. In Google’s case, it may simply pay you to monitor your app habits, reports Engadget.

Google, not surprisingly, isn’t commenting on the report. But a service like Mobile Meter would make sense for Google, as it can’t sit back and let Facebook gather data about mobile users that Google can’t touch.

It would also be similar to the Android mobile advertising company Locket, which pays users for placing ads on their lock screens. The research company Nielsen also rewards people for giving up some of their mobile data habits. Just like our willingness to offer up personal information to the likes of Facebook and Google, there will likely be a violent reaction to this new breed of privacy-invading apps, but it’s becoming clear that they’re going to play a big role in the future of mobile.