Comment by tc
15 years ago
What if his statement was not intended as a moral imperative, but as practical advice?
Perhaps he is saying, "The fact of the matter is that we're required to retain and release lots of information. If you don't want that information being passed around, you probably shouldn't give it to us. Sorry, we do the best we can under the circumstances."
"If you have something that you don't want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn't be [googling] it in the first place."
It could also, of course, be simple uncritical rationalization.
If staying in business and out of the cross-hairs of the DoJ's anti-trust division means you have to play ball with some data retention "requests," then you're probably going to rationalize a million tenuously logical reasons why that's the right thing to do.
To be fair, you don't have a lot of choice in deciding whether or not to comply with a National Security Letter. I think "because I'm not going to go to jail for our users" is a perfectly logical reason.
You can also say to your users - we have a problem with this legislation we are moving our servers to Iceland/Bermuda/Switzerland.
When the government sees it hitting their tax take they will listen
2 replies →
On the other hand, are Google required to store the data? I suspect they aren't, they only need to hand over what they do have when asked. So they could always let you opt out of them tracking your data. Which they don't. Sure, it might slightly reduce the quality of search results those users get to see, but that's a sacrifice I'd be willing to make.
But it's worse than that, tc. Why do they keep the information for so long? Because they are required? No. They monetize it. Sooooo, in the future there will come great pressure to increase the value of Google stock. Not today, perhaps, but some day.
When that day comes, insurance companies are going to say, "We'll make it worth your while if you tell us who is googling for 'breast cancer;' 'diabetes;' 'melanoma.'" At some point in the future the major shareholders (think Carl Icahn or some such character) will make it awfully hard to say, "no." Just a more direct way to monetize the data.
As I said elsewhere here, google should, if they don't want to be evil, allow us to opt for a poorer search experience and not keep our data.
Storing search queries genuinely helps improve Google's search results. It's not inherently evil.
And I don't buy your slippery slope argument. Sure, Google could sell your search patterns. And your ISP could sell your browsing habits. And ask.com's AskEraser feature could all be a lie and it too could be selling your queries...
Ultimately if you don't trust Google with your search queries, then you should take Schmidt's advice and not query anything embarrassing.
Storing search queries genuinely helps improve Google's search results. It's not inherently evil.
Agreed. I don't believe in inherent evil. I do believe that certain business structures lead to behavior that some observers would consider "evil" and others would simply call "upholding fiduciary responsibility." But that's a discussion for another thread.
And I don't buy your slippery slope argument.
And I can't make you. But you're a fool if you dismiss it out of hand. The Facebook beacon debacle is a shiny reminder of what can happen if we stand by and let it.
I have no problem with Google's handling of my information at this time. In particular, I'm not worried about embarrassing queries as much as an elderly person you love, for example, being denied insurance coverage (or only given coverage at exorbitant rates) because the company is able to argue "pre-existing condition" (or some other claim of exclusion) from private information.
But if this hoopla is unnerving, wait until people find out how supermarkets sell loyalty card information!
Ultimately if you don't trust Google with your search queries, then you should take Schmidt's advice and not query anything embarrassing.
Or take my advice, sidle up to an open WiFi network (or if you are really nefarious, crack a "secure" one--bet that won't get logged), load up a flash-based Linux distro with no means of storing anything permanently, and query till your heart's content. If that's more privacy than you need, how about Private Browsing mode, which is in every major browser now (except IE? dunno.)
Sheesh!--the hue and cry over Google and privacy completely overlooks the fact that the Internet is the most anonymous means of exchanging information ever created. Yes, unfortunately legal and profit motives mean your online activities are, to some extent, recorded. But breaking the link between "you" and what you do online is trivial, and the more your privacy matters to you, the more thoroughly can you achieve that separation.
1 reply →
Who's requiring them to retain anything? For 180 days?
And retaining for policing/security reasons doesn't mean you should use the data for other privacy-invading targeting.
Actually there's no law in the U.S. about data retention (E.U. has one) but companies keep the data for their own engineering and marketing purposes AND to stay in good graces of authorities. (The Patriot Act and ECPA, among other laws, specify what data has to be turned over with a lawful request, but they don't require any entity to actually have that info.)
Patriot Act compliance
see the Yahoo leak from cryptomeme http://cryptome.org/isp-spy/yahoo-spy.pdf
My wild speculation would be that (related to tc's above) it's a mutual "you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours" with the DOJ. I'd be surprised if there weren't regulations in place which required them to keep the data for that long.
It's not like this is a problem specific to Google. Credit cards, for instance, are very convenient but also easily traced if you are up to no good. Nobody thinks the credit card companies should protect your anonymity -- if you're buying something you shouldn't, don't use a credit card.
What if his statement was not intended as a moral imperative, but as practical advice?
Not that you could tell from the article's headline. Either The Register is being sensationalist, or just didn't see it in those terms.
That's pretty much all The Register does.
As more practical advice, if you're doing something you don't want others associating with your IP address, use an anonymizer you feel you can trust.
The Register being sensationalist? Impossible!
Exactly.
Finally, a reasoned response. I came in here just to say this; Can't believe what an uproar this is causing...
The uproar is caused because here's a man who knows more about me than my own mother and he is saying things my mother would have been ashamed of :-)
Telling me how to do what I want to do is practical. Telling me what to do or not to do is patronizing.
Even if you want to search for that - do so without logging into your google account.
If that is what he is saying, he should just say this. Wouldn't it be simpler?
Maybe he's blinking out morse code with his eyelids.
You mean searching for "illegal hot nude child porn photos for download in the usa, my address is 100 Foo street", is a poor idea?
Searching for 'chronic heart disease' might be a bad idea if your employer or health insurer sign up to a future Google employee watch (tm) service