EFF Warns Not to Use Google Desktop

neelm writes "The EFF is asking users not to use the new version of Google Desktop that has a 'search across computers' option. The option will store copies of documents on your hard drive on Google servers, where the government or anyone who wants to may subpoena (i.e. no search warrants) the information. Google says it is not yet scanning the files for advertising, but it hasn't ruled out the possibility."

Comments

Copernic

[CMiYC]

I use Copernic instead of Google Desktop. I used GDS until I got a new laptop for work. Then I tried Copernic. I'm not sure if it is any better than GDS. The one aspect of Copernic I really appreciate is that it isn't integrated into my web browser. It has its own search application that looks like what I expect an indexing application to look like.

Re:Copernic

[zerocool^]

Have you tried the windows search? OMG its so slow. You are talking 10+ mins to search all my hard drives/folders.

You know why?

It's actually "searching". It's not a background process or daemon or whatever sitting in your memory, taking note of everything you're editing, changing, adding to or deleting from your file system. It doesn't take 6 hours to find the time to create its searchable database like Google desktop does. It just searches. It's find / -name 'filename'. That's all it does.

When I heard how fast google search was, I thought "how perfect". At the time, I worked at a local computer shop who did lots of backups. We'd pull a hard drive out of a client's computer and search for the requested data (i.e. jpegs, doc files, address book, etc). Google Desktop search was going to revolutionize our task. Damn kludgey MS Search.

When you install GDS, it informs you that it may take a few hours to fully index the HDD. That's *slower* than MS search. Not to mention, utterly useless when you're attaching 50GB of data to the host computer 3 times a day, digging through it, and removing it.

Know why MS's search is slow? Because that's actually how long it takes.

~W

Re:Copernic

[killjoe]

Do a google for "agent ransack". There is a free version. It's pretty awesome and usually the second thing I install on a windows PC (first being firefox of course).

It does name searches, it does text searches, it does regular expressions etc.

As for windows search I agree it's a piece of shit. Why they couldn't just put something like locate into place I'll never know.

Of course unless you are forced to use windows I would reccomend a switch to mac. The amazing spotlight search is worth the extra money by itself.

Feature must be enabled first

[mineavatar]

The "search across computers" options is DISABLED by default. The user has to turn it on, and only then is any data stored on Google servers (and then it is only stored on the servers for no more than a month). CNN was repeating the same inaccurate statement this morning.

What about copyright?

[Pranjal]

I guess anyone can easily upload copyrighted MP3's? Does that mean Google is a RIAA target now?

Re:store copies?

[NewKimAll]

The actual facts are the following:

Search Across Computers also has the following preferences, found on the Desktop Preferences page:

* Name this computer: This name will be displayed on remote computers that are part of the same Google account group.
* My other computers can search this computer's:
o Documents and web history
o Documents only
o Web history only
* Clear my files from Google: In order to share your indexed files between your computers, we first copy this content to Google Desktop servers located at Google. This is necessary, for example, if one of your computers is turned off or otherwise offline when new or updated items are indexed on another of your machines. We store this data temporarily on Google Desktop servers and automatically delete older flies, and your data is never accessible by anyone doing a Google search. You can learn more by reading the Google Desktop privacy policy.

While your data is automatically deleted from our servers, you can use the Clear my Files from Google button to manually remove all your files from Google Desktop servers. Note that if these files haven't yet been copied to your other computers, clicking this button will prevent you from finding them when you search from your other computers. The files will, of course, still be searchable from their computer of origin.


So it appears that your data will be on a Google Server temporarily. Also, is it really feasible that Google would even want to maintain a SAN Array capable of storing EVERY document for EVERY user of this thing? Why would they want to waste their money collecting everybody's garbage?
--
Want to share a file across the network between your computers? Just use FTP or PCAnywhere. I wish that VNC software would allow file transfers (hint, hint)

Re:Double standards?

[NetRAVEN5000]

Can someone please explain why information sharing (the Internet) is a good idea? Can someone please explain why making your files available to others (the Internet, file-sharing programs like BitTorrent) is a good idea?

And can someone please explain to parent why it's a good idea to RTFA? It specifically says, "If a consumer chooses to use it, the new "Search Across Computers" feature will store copies of the user's Word documents, PDFs, spreadsheets and other text-based documents on Google's own servers".

If you don't want Google searching your files, quit your bitching and select "No, thanks, don't upload my files" or whatever.

Re:EFF, Shmeff

[mu22le]

If you do not wish google to track you just install the Customizegoogle extension in firefox and selet anonimyze me in the privacy tab.

It's not that hard!