Report: Yahoo, Microsoft to reveal Web search privacy policies
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Blog: Financial Times reports Yahoo, Microsoft to reveal Web search data retention policies at urging of European Union group.
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Internet giant Yahoo is introducing new search engine tools that will enable users to create personal folders and share their favorite links with others.
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If you use shared or public computers, you have a new privacy risk to consider: Google Desktop Search. Announced last week and currently available in a beta version, Google Desktop Search allows you to scour
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HONG KONG -- Yahoo Inc. did not violate Hong Kong's privacy laws when it provided prosecutors with information about a Chinese reporter accused of leaking state secrets, authorities said Wednesday.
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(InfoWorld) - Microsoft is joining Ask.com in offering Web surfers a way to use its search engines anonymously, and the two companies are now calling on the search and online advertising industry to develop a common set of privacy practices. By year's end, Microsoft will give users a way to search anonymously on its Microsoft Windows Live Web sites, and it will also implement a new data retention policy that after 18 months will scrub all search query data of any information that could be used to identify the searcher. "We think that we as an industry ought to take a look at ways to further enhance privacy protections," said Microsoft Chief Privacy Strategist Peter Cullen. "We're really trying to make sure that people always have the ability to have a trusted experience." These steps areÂ similar to those taken by Ask.comÂ last week and are part of an effort to create industry consensus on privacy practices, Cullen said. When visitors use Microsoft's Windows Live search engine, Microsoft stores the search queries along with some information on the person doing the searching in order to provide them with targeted advertising. Like all the major search providers, Microsoft doesn't associate names or e-mail addresses with this data, but it does keep IP (Internet Protocol) addresses and some other identifying information, such as the zip codes of Windows Live users. Privacy advocates are concerned that this data could be misused. "Search terms are often about drugs, they're about sex and they're about rock and roll," said Peter Swire, a law professor with Ohio State University who was the White House's Chief Counselor for Privacy under the Clinton administration. "There are a lot of people who are feeling that they're doing a private exploration and wouldn't want their search terms as part of their permanent record." Last year, AOLÂ researchers inadvertently illustrated how this data could be misused when theyÂ posted data on about 650,000 searchesÂ made on the company's Web site. New York Times reporters were able to track down one of the searchers based on the information in the database. Ask.com and Microsoft's announcements put pressure on Google to improve its privacy practices, Swire said. Google retains part of the IP address associated with searches and has not promised to provide anonymous searching, he explained. It is becoming even more important for companies to safeguard consumers' privacy as the online advertising and search industries consolidate, Swire said. Both Microsoft and Google have made major moves in this space over the past few months with their plannedÂ acquisitions of aQuantiveÂ andÂ DoubleClick. More pressure is coming from the European Union, which has placed limits on the amount of time search companies can retain this type of data and isÂ reviewing Google's DoubleClick acquisition. Microsoft and Ask.com will invite privacy advocates and Internet search and advertising companies such as Google, AOL, and Yahoo to come together and more clearly explain how the industry will handle privacy. "The first step is, we'll be in contact with all the other players in this space and talk about what a summit might look like," said Cullen. "We're very happy to host it, if that's the answer ... both Microsoft and Ask.com think that this is the time to make this happen." The two companies expect to report on the results of this outreach by September. That's right around the time that the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is expected to host a workshop discussing these same issues, Swire said. "Now we're getting public debate and corporate debate on best practices. And the FTC will be trying to push that this fall." Â
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Microsoft will introduce its long-awaited Internet search engine on Thursday, a person knowledgeable about the announcement said.
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The portal's lapse tells a lot about the state of Web search privacy
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Yahoo has announced that it will introduce a downloadable desktop search. It will use technology licensed from a California-based three-year startup firm, X1 Technologies.
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Renegotiation may provide glimpse into Microsoft's search plans.
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The possibility of a merger between Microsoft and Yahoo is raising concerns among privacy advocates, who worry that it could lead to even more  tracking of online behavior for advertising purposes.
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Google Inc, the world&#39;s largest  Internet company, will propose at a meeting of international  policymakers in France on Friday that national regulators agree  on a basic set of global privacy protections.
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Internet media company Yahoo Inc.  on Tuesday said it would soon begin testing a travel price comparison search engine called FareChase as it further integrates Web search services into its offerings.
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After Google announced their search software utility and Yahoo! told the world they are working on a similar program. MSN is now beta testing their software.
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Microsoft Corp. will make changes to its desktop search program following a complaint to the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) by Google Inc., a news report said late Tuesday.
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Internet portal Yahoo! says it will release a desktop search in the New Year some three months after Google. Desktop search is the latest battleground between the major search engines as they seek to gain
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After scrutinizing Google's user-privacy protections, EU investigators are turning their attentions to rivals such as Yahoo and Windows Live.
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Blog: The Federal Trade Commission plans to expand its probe beyond Google-DoubleClick to also look at Microsoft and Yahoo deals, the Wall Street Journal reported Thursday