Google's privacy faux pas with Reader
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Google blasted for opt-out sharing feature in Google Reader just like Facebook was criticized for Beacon ad service.
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People who use public or workplace computers for e-mail, instant messaging and Web searching have a new privacy risk to worry about: Google's free new tool that indexes a PC's contents for quickly locating data.
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Americans used to guard their privacy. Now they give it up with nary a whimper. And along comes Google, to apply the coup de grace. Commentary by Tony Long.
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An experiment started two weeks ago by Google to leverage its Talk application as a way of sharing news feeds from Google Reader, has been met with some derision. What may be more surprising, though, is the company's response.
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(InfoWorld) - Google Inc. will make the data it stores about end users anonymous in its server logs after 18 months, part of an effort to deflate concerns about privacy raised last month by a European Union working group. In a letter sent to the group on Monday, Google also said it is looking at ways to redesign its Web cookies and reduce the length of time they are stored on users' PCs. Cookies are small files that uniquely identify a Web browser and are widely used to track surfing behavior and store user preferences. The letter, from Google's global privacy counsel, Peter Fleischer, was in response to a letter sent last month by the E.U.'s Article 29 Data Protection Working Party, which outlined its concerns about Google's service. Among them, it questioned why the company needed to retain its server logs for 18 to 24 months, saying the practice does not appear to meet Europe's data protection rules. The server logs, which include search histories, can be linked to individual users and therefore constitute personal data, the group said. Fleischer responded by saying that Google would make data anonymous in its server logs after 18 months, the low end of its previous commitment. "We ... firmly reject any suggestions that we could meet our legitimate interests in security, innovation and anti-fraud efforts with any retention periods shorter than 18 months," Fleischer wrote. The company said it needs the log data to improve its search algorithms, fight click fraud and spam, comply with data retention laws, and meet "valid legal orders from law enforcement as they investigate and prosecute serious crimes like child exploitation." It noted that the E.U.'s own Data Retention Directive will require companies to retain such data for 6 to 18 months when new laws go into effect by 2009. Since few countries have passed their retention laws yet, "we have no choice but to be prepared to retain log data for up to 24 months," Fleischer wrote. The working group had also complained about the length of time Google stores cookies on users' PCs. Google said that it is exploring ways to redesign its cookies to improve privacy and that it would make an announcement "in the coming months." One observer, while acknowledging privacy concerns about Google, was critical of the working group for singling out one company. "These concerns would have been equally applicable to Yahoo or Microsoft or many other companies on the Internet," said Danny Sullivan, editor-in-chief of the Web site Search Engine Land, who wrote a detailed analysis of Google's response. Microsoft and Yahoo have not specified how long they store their log files, he said, and they may retain them for longer than Google. He also said the group showed "technical ignorance" by focussing on server logs. Like other search engines, Google collects information about users each time they register for a service such as Gmail or Adwords. These "user databases" contain more personal information than server logs can gather, and they are often retained until a user closes the account or actively deletes the information, he said. The working group in its letter last month cited Google's "market position and ever-growing dominance." It also thanked the company for its "ongoing engagement with the data protection community," especially in contrast with "a lack of engagement by some of the other leading players" in the search industry. The group is expected to discuss Google's response at a meeting later this month. Â
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Just like Ask.com Unable to keep up with Google's market share, the other big search engines are determined to top its privacy policies. Last week, Ask.com announced new software that keeps web searches completely anonymous - a first among major search engines - and now Microsoft and Yahoo! have unveiled their own brand-spanking-new privacy principles.â¦
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Google shortens cookie expiration to two years, but regular users won't see privacy benefits.
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Media & professional: Google to begin deleting private information it stores on the computers of millions of users.
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Before heading over to the Web 2.0 conference at the Palace Hotel in SF this morning, I couldn't resist doing some more digging into alternate user interfaces for news reading based on the NY Times keywords.  One thing I learned the hard way is that when you access the Times site from a script (not through a browser) if you try to read an article that's too old (not sure what the time limit is) it tries to redirect you to a login page (which is pretty pointless considering that there's no human being around to log in). I hit this problem yesterday, and then hit it again this morning, but couldn't remember what the problem was. So by writing it up this time I hope to remember.  No doubt some debunked hack journalist posing as a tech industry mogul will slander me for this, but the asshat asshole has no idea how blogging works, and who the fuck cares what he thinks anyway. "cheesecake"
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Blog: Google News shows images linked with article extracts
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Users will be able to choose whether their pages are revealed to outside search engines.
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Google has announced a new desktop search application that enables users to search their e-mail, files, web history, and chats. Perhaps learning from previous mistakes, Google says it has designed the product &quot;from the ground up to respect user privacy.
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Google is Mozilla's sugar daddy.  Is this cause for alarm?
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Though communications protections exist, the law is fuzzy regarding internet and e-mail activity. Watch out for the legalization of digital mind readers tracing internet users' thoughts and interests, and trampling privacy rights in the process.
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Stop looking at Yahoo!'s paper, Google.
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By Michael Liedtke Associated Press  SAN FRANCISCO -- Google Inc.'s privacy practices are the worst among the Internet's top destinations, according to a watchdog group seeking to intensify the recent focus on how the online search leader handles personal information about its users.
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Social networking sites like Facebook have wooed millions of users with their easy format for keeping in touch but left them navigating the pitfalls of interacting online -- is it really private?