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nytimes What Google Should Roll Out Next: A Privacy Upgrade E-Mail
From: "David J. Farber" <dave () farber net>
Date: Mon, 28 Nov 2005 13:11:45 GMT
What Google Should Roll Out Next: A Privacy Upgrade E-Mail Article By ADAM COHEN Published: November 28, 2005 At a North Carolina strangulation-murder trial this month, prosecutors announced an unusual piece of evidence: Google searches allegedly done by the defendant that included the words "neck" and "snap."... But it might have come directly from Google, which - unbeknownst to many users - keeps records of every search on its site, in ways that can be traced back to individuals. Google is rolling out revolutionary new features at a blistering rate, most recently Google Base, which could evolve into a classified ad service, and the Google Book Search Library Project, which aims to put a vast number of books online. Google's stock recently soared past $400 a share, putting its market capitalization ahead of Time Warner and Gannett combined, and the personal fortunes of its founders, Sergey Brin and Larry Page, above $14 billion. Google is the subject of a new book, "The Google Story," by David Vise and Mark Malseed, that tracks the company's rise from a student project at Stanford through its success in outmaneuvering Microsoft, Yahoo, AOL and other behemoths for Internet dominance. ...At a time when "Web portals" - sites that directed users to online services - were seen as the future, Mr. Brin and Mr. Page were convinced Internet searches would be pivotal. ...Google strictly separated out "sponsored" results, or ads, from search results, and gave up untold millions of dollars in revenue by keeping Google's home page ad free. ...It stores their search data, possibly forever, and puts "cookies" on their computers that make it possible to track those searches in a personally identifiable way - cookies that do not expire until 2038.... Google's written privacy policy reserves the right to pool what it learns about users from their searches with what it learns from their e-mail messages, though Google says it won't do so. ...If the federal government announced plans to directly collect the sort of data Google does, there would be an uproar - in fact there was in 2003, when the Pentagon announced its Total Information Awareness program, which was quickly shut down. ...It is hard to believe most Google users know they have a cookie that expires in 2038, or have thought much about the government's ability to read their search history and stored e-mail messages without them knowing it. ------------------------------------- You are subscribed as lists-ip () insecure org To manage your subscription, go to http://v2.listbox.com/member/?listname=ip Archives at: http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/
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- nytimes What Google Should Roll Out Next: A Privacy Upgrade E-Mail David J. Farber (Nov 28)