nytimes What Google Should Roll Out Next: A Privacy Upgrade E-Mail

["David J. Farber" <dave () farber net>]

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/