Google Releases Google Browser Sync Extension

Pneuma ROCKS writes "Google has just released the Google Browser Sync extension for Firefox. This extension allows you to save your bookmarks, history and passwords on Google servers, effectively giving you a 'roaming profile,' which you can sync on any computer running Firefox (and the extension, of course)."

Comments

Encrypted?

[Buran]

This says nothing about whether the data is encrypted in transit or, more importantly, on the servers. I don't like the idea of Google or anyone who might hack in snooping on this data.

Re:Encrypted?

[0racle]

Well if you already use GMail, what's a little more personal information? Of course Google can index it and add it to the increasingly large profile of you.

Re:Encrypted?

[zburner07]

Actually it tells you right here in the FAQ.

Re:Encrypted?

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, it does say it will be encrypted:

http://www.google.com/tools/firefox/browsersync/fa q.html#q9

Why do I need to provide a PIN?

The PIN you create during setup is used to encrypt information that's synced between your computers, which may include sensitive information such as your passwords for websites. We use your PIN to unlock that information. Without your PIN, no one will be able to read the information that's being transmitted between your computers via Google Browser Sync.

Re:Encrypted?

[Xhris]

Really why woud you care? If your keeping sensitive information in your bookmarks list then your a fool. Personally I have been copying my bookmarks.html to ~/publcic_html for years. Its very handy when using someone elses computer and trying to remeber a URL. (Actually it was more useful in the pre-google days. These days I mostly find the URL via goodle anyhow).

Re:Encrypted?

[spir0]

GMail (including GMail for hosted domains) is not encrypted. Logins are, but once you're in it's not. How many emails do you receive that contain passwords to sites you registered with? Every time you open one of those messages, the data has the potential to be sniffed.

I don't believe this is any worse than that.

You can't hide in the shadows your whole life. You've gotta come out of your closet and let someone sniff you once in a while. It's very liberating.

Honest.

Re:Encrypted?

[Jah-Wren Ryel]

Actually, it does say it will be encrypted:

Its not really clear about how much of your information is encryped. Your passwords yes, but your browsing history? Your bookmarks?

I would expect google to want to datamine both of those things, but I would not feel comfortable giving it to them in a form that they could use because it means that someone else, like our friendly NSA for example, could use it too.

With that in mind - does anyone know of an extention that does the same sort of sync, but encrypts everything and lets you store it on the website or ftp server of your choice (presuming of course that you have write permission there)?

Re:Encrypted?

[Random Destruction]

by saying nearly, they saved themselves a world of hurt if someone manages to crack one some day. Pretending encryption is 100% secure is foolish.

Re:Encrypted?

[Overly Critical Guy]

For all I know, you've got two heads and seven titties. For all I know, Slashdot is run by Steve Jobs. For all I know...

Re:Encrypted?

[Kadin2048]

The "nearly" is just them doing the usual corporate CMA.

If I were overseeing a high-profile company who was releasing a product that in any way used encryption, you can bet I would couch every claim about its security with some sort of qualifier.

No intelligent person ever uses superlatives when discussing encryption, unless you want to be on the hook in case it ever gets broken.

Re:Encrypted?

[tmjr3353]

Actually, I'm pretty sure there's both an encrypted an unecrypted version. Once actually inside G-Mail both https:/// and http:/// will work -- and there is a difference; when they first released the messaging inside the webmail page it only worked in the unsecure page.

Re:Encrypted?

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

"It depends on how much of correct data you provided when you signed up."

I don't think it's as simple as that. If you're using GMail, you're likely logged in to Google every time you do a search. Do a bunch of porn viewing, and Google has the means to link that to your login. Take it a step further and keep your bookmarks there.. well... they certainly have more to draw on.

Personally, I'm not so worried about what Google sees. I'm worried about the recent moves by the gov't to collect that info. Google is unintentionally setting up a nice little trap for a bunch of people. (No, this isn't a Google is evil statement, just pointing out the dangers of centralizing all this stuff.)

Re:Encrypted?

[Dan Berlin]

If you look at the extension, you will see you can choose to encrypt any/all of what it can sync.

Re:Encrypted?

[tftp]

If you're using GMail, you're likely logged in to Google every time you do a search.

Why should I do that? No, of course I don't stay logged in any more than it is necessary.

Google is unintentionally setting up a nice little trap for a bunch of people.

I don't believe that founders and managers of a multi-billion dollar enterprise are so dumb that they don't realize what they are doing. I am convinced that they are perfectly aware of all the implications - they know them better than we do, it's their business after all. Also, the government is not silent on the matter - it approached Google already, so claiming innocence won't work. Google knows damn well what it is doing, and that is to become the ultimate data warehouse for, and about, everyone on the planet. And all that data will be for sale.

Re:Encrypted?

[elyk]

Try Foxmarks Bookmark Synchronizer. At first it appears to only work with their servers, but if you look at the advanced settings it allows you to specify your own ftp server. I'm not sure if it encrypts it, but you could get a reasonable level of security by storing it in a non-web-accesible ftp folder, and there might be a setting to use secure ftp or https; I forget (I uninstalled it because I realized I didn't really need it).

Re:Encrypted?

[aussie_a]

Do they store the PIN on their systems? Of course they do. Therefore they can unencrypt your info any time they want.

Re:Encrypted?

[ahxcjb]

tcpdump anyone..? ;)

Re:Encrypted?

[nacturation]

It depends on how much of correct data you provided when you signed up.

And of course you never have your friends send you *real* email nor mention any personal information, right? Your Gmail account is just for spam collection?

Re:Encrypted?

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

"I don't believe that founders and managers of a multi-billion dollar enterprise are so dumb that they don't realize what they are doing."

I was not trying to imply that. They obviously feel very comfortable with what they're doing, but that alone will not protect their users. In theory, the gov't shouldn't have even asked them for the records, yet it still happened. Worse, we've got a monkey in the white-house that may bend the rules a bit to try even harder. Now maybe my imagination's getting ahead of me, but just because they think they know what they're doing doesn't mean anybody's safe. Once you've commited the data to Google, that's it, you cannot undo it.

Re:Encrypted?

[the100rabh]

Its clear that its a HTTPS thing...so how security is not much of concern.....I browse in office and home....Now I have the bookmarks perfectly synchronised....whats better for me than this...Its just a matter of trust thats all...the day trust is broken its all over

Re:Encrypted?

[azuretek]

I'm pretty sure from what I read of their FAQ that the encryption/decryption is all client side. I wouldn't imagine they keep the PIN on their server.

I haven't looked at the actual firefox extension but it wouldn't make sense to offer encryption and still store the PIN.

Re:Encrypted?

[vux984]

I haven't looked at the actual firefox extension but it wouldn't make sense to offer encryption and still store the PIN.

It would if the point of encryption is to keep it private *in-transit*. Just as HTTPS doesn't prevent the site you are interacting with to get all that data you submitted, the encryption prevents bystanders from seeing it.

So all this encryption does is give you some security that nobody but google will be able to see it. So if you value your privacy at all the question remains, do you trust google with it? Do you trust google to look out for your interests, even under government pressure?

Just for Now? or Always and Forever?

I'm with that other individual: Is there any extension that does this with an ftp/webdav/... server of *my* choice?

Re:Encrypted?

[grammar fascist]

Its not really clear about how much of your information is encryped. Your passwords yes, but your browsing history? Your bookmarks?

I've just downloaded and installed it. It automatically encrypts your cookies and passwords (it doesn't let you change this setting), and gives you the option of encrypting history, bookmarks, and tabs and windows if you choose to synchronize them. Additionally, it's all optional.

And if you were really security-conscious, you could tell it to not synchronize anything at all.

Assuming it keeps working (it has so far), I really like it. It makes keeping bookmarks actually worthwhile.

Re:Encrypted?

[Dominic_Mazzoni]

From the FAQ (emphasis added by me):

What's the point of encrypting my information?

By encrypting your information, it will be transmitted to and stored on Google's servers in a format that is nearly impossible to interpret without the PIN. That means that without the PIN, no one, not even Google, will be able to read your data

Re:Encrypted?

[blirp]

> If you're using GMail, you're likely logged in to Google every time you do a search.

Why should I do that? No, of course I don't stay logged in any more than it is necessary.

Unless you make sure to clear all Google-cookies after logging
out and before logging back in GMail, it won't really matter
if you're logged in at the time you're searching or not.

M.

Re:Encrypted?

[ergo98]

People that have access and sufficinet skill and the motivation, find much more profitable ways
to exploit their power than to read your ultimately important personal data from gmail. I find
it interesting that people have such an ego boost that they imagine that from the half a billion
interactive net users, they and their pocket money are the targets of all the hackers.

I'm amazed that anyone would still say something this stupid (and that others would actually moderate it up). I seem to get several dozen phishing attempts per day, with people trying to gain access to my PayPal, Ebay, bank accounts, and other online services. I guess I must be stupid and rich to gain the attention of such target limited hackers, right?

No, of course not. Not only are there countless hackers out there with nefarious intentions, but usually their dirty work can be automated -- e.g. a simple trojan that your cousin has on his laptop, which then takes over your router in a method only possible from the inside (or installing a net listener), then automatically relaying whatever information they want. This is ignoring the fact that carriers aren't exactly the pinnacle of security, and it's entirely possible that curious or criminal employees have net monitors, and that's not even including the whole government angle.

The "security doesn't matter because no one cares about you" angle was dumb when people were saying it in the 90s. Now it just strikes me as unbelievable.

I have zero trojans of viruses on my PC (despite your defeatist "why bother fighting them?" attitude), and I want sensitive communications to be encrypted. Everyone should demand the same.

Ps. if you are familiar with how SSL or any exchangeable keypair based encryption protocols work,
you should realize that people who have constant access to your network traffic, will find out your
information anyway.

Wow, really? Care to enlighten us on how that could be, apart from some temporary implementation defects in a couple of clients (such as Internet Explorer). I call bullshit, and say that the entire foundation of your argument is ignorant nonsense.

Re:Encrypted?

[jdbartlett]

Just tested your theory using "personalized search". If they are logging search results of logged-out users, they aren't displaying them in the "personalized search" database. It'd also give them pretty inaccurate data - people logging out of a public machine aren't necessarily going to wipe all cookies in the browser for the next user (unless a very sensitive sysadmin has set the machine up to do this every time the browser closes).

I call tinfoil hat.

Re:Encrypted?

[nacturation]

So the information you're revealing is your personal interest in the subject matter of those mailing lists. Marketers don't necessarily care what your name is... they just want to know what to market at you. If you buy, they'll get your particulars then.

Re:Encrypted?

[DragonWriter]

In theory, the gov't shouldn't have even asked them for the records, yet it still happened. Worse, we've got a monkey in the white-house that may bend the rules a bit to try even harder.

The problem here is not with Google. Its with an out-of-control government and and apathetic public that fails to reign in the government. Google allowing users to store data or not allowing users to store data makes little difference in that.

Ads will conveniently follow your bookmarks

[atlacatl]

Google's brand, I think, is being devalue with their main revenue stream being advertisement.

You know that all that information about bookmarks and favourites will be of use to marketers.

From my part, for now, I will pass...

Re:Ads will conveniently follow your bookmarks

[generic-man]

Google can already follow you around the 'net using their ad network. Blogs, photos, news sites, etc., all have Google Adsense. That same cookie builds up a wealth of data about you. If this offends you, putting your bookmarks up on Google shouldn't be any worse -- what could you possibly be telling them that they don't already know?

(Besides your passwords to other sites...)

Re:Ads will conveniently follow your bookmarks

[Anonymous Coward]

it beats the penis enlargement ads, now google will allready know I have a large member & don't need such herbal enhancements

Re:Ads will conveniently follow your bookmarks

[bergeron76]

He's actually right. If your main source of revenue is advertising dollars, your biggest asset is your "client base" and all the information you have about them - basically a big database about who likes what and how you can contact them. Put those two things together, and you have a goldmine for corporate marketing/advertising departments. They even have a very ubiquitous software application called "Goldmine" (a CRM app).

Joe Q. Public likes Jessica R. Abbit, but he's a high-schooler on a budget. Instead of sending him the add for the Tacori Diamond bracelet, let's send him the advertisement for the CVS box-o-chocolates. He's more likely to respond to that ad, which results in increased revenue for GOOG.

Information is valuable. Organized information that no one else has is "invaluable"!

Re:Ads will conveniently follow your bookmarks

[jhoger]

Yes, because as everyone knows, businesses being able to more effectively communicate and accurately target the right customers is the worst thing that can happen.

Really, marketing is not a dirty word...

-- John.

Re:Ads will conveniently follow your bookmarks

[killjoe]

Any information Google can collect, MS can collect. They own the OS remember?

Re:Ads will conveniently follow your bookmarks

[Stop Or I'll Noop]

The data is encrypted before being sent to Google's servers. Nice knee-jerk reaction though.

Mod parent down. So what if it's encrypted iF Google has the encryption key. From the FAQ:

Why do I need to provide a PIN?
The PIN you create during setup is used to encrypt information that's synced between your computers, which may include sensitive information such as your passwords for websites. We use your PIN to unlock that information.

Re:Ads will conveniently follow your bookmarks

[DeXOR]

Keep grandparent modded up, mod parent down. Google doesn't have your key, atleast according to their FAQ:

That means that without the PIN, no one, not even Google, will be able to read your data.

Re:Ads will conveniently follow your bookmarks

[RedWizzard]

He's actually right. If your main source of revenue is advertising dollars, your biggest asset is your "client base" and all the information you have about them - basically a big database about who likes what and how you can contact them. Put those two things together, and you have a goldmine for corporate marketing/advertising departments. They even have a very ubiquitous software application called "Goldmine" (a CRM app).

All of which is completely irrelevant to this discussion because the information you are givng them is encrypted and they can't read it.

Re:Ads will conveniently follow your bookmarks

[RedWizzard]

So what if it's encrypted iF Google has the encryption key.

Did you not read the rest of that FAQ? Or are you being deliberately misleading? From the FAQ:

What's the point of encrypting my information?

By encrypting your information, it will be transmitted to and stored on Google's servers in a format that is nearly impossible to interpret without the PIN. That means that without the PIN, no one, not even Google, will be able to read your data.

Re:Ads will conveniently follow your bookmarks

[tftp]

That means that without the PIN, no one, not even Google, will be able to read your data.

This must be written by a lawyer. It does not say if Google has the PIN or not.

Re:Ads will conveniently follow your bookmarks

[krunk4ever]

This can really be interpreted in 2 ways:

We, Google Server, will use your PIN to unlock that information
OR
We, Google Client App, will use your PIN to unlock that information.

I personally don't see why Google would ever need to unlock the encrypted information on their side (unless they want to be evil), and obviously, it won't be you who's unlocking the information, but the firefox extension (we, google client app) will be.

Re:Ads will conveniently follow your bookmarks

[NoMaster]

Yes, because as everyone knows, businesses being able to more effectively communicate and accurately target the right customers is the worst thing that can happen.

It's a bit hard to explain without rising to hyperbole - but imagine if we'd all been happily using riaasearch.com for the last few years. Everyone has riaasearch textads all over their blogs, torrent sites ask you to click one before entering, and every second person has a riaasearch toolbar in their browser.

Now, imagine if riaasearch turned evil...

Really, marketing is not a dirty word...

You're right. It's not a dirty word; it's a weasel word...

Like those cat parasite things; Toxoplasma. Supposedly makes some people feel good, more outgoing and warmhearted. But a parasite is still a parasite...

Re:Ads will conveniently follow your bookmarks

[4D6963]

You know that all that information about bookmarks and favourites will be of use to marketers.

From TFFAQ "That means that without the PIN, no one, not even Google, will be able to read your data"

In other words, no Google won't use your "bookmarks *and* favourites" (that's the same thing IIRC) for marketing since they won't be able to read them.

History?

[sugapablo]

Great, now not only can Google know how many times I search for "MILF", but they can see all the pr0n sites I visit too. They're worse than the NSA. :)

Pr0n

[pete-classic]

Wait, I don't want all my bookmarks from home in my work browser!

-Peter

Re:Pr0n

[Zathrus]

Wait, I don't want all my bookmarks from home in my work browser!

And I don't want all of my work bookmarks in my home browser. I have a number of work-related bookmarks that point to local files (such as Oracle docs) and to places on the corporate intranet. Both are useless to me from home (the intranet ones may be useful if I was VPN'd, but that's exceptionally rare).

I would love to find a bookmarks synchronizer that allows you to exclude bookmarks and still work through the regular bookmarks menu.

Ultimately I'd like to have "groups" of bookmarks and be able to synch particular groups between systems. I've seen some that have this concept, but they don't work through the regular bookmark menu.

Spiffy

[Fo0dNippl3]

So does that mean we can finally use our Google(TM) Browser Sync to save our settings on Google(TM) Search and Google(TM) Mail anywhere on the Google(TM) Earth?

BookmarkRank?

[rjamestaylor]

BookmarkRank to augment PageRank?

Hmmm.....

For those who are loathe ...

[El Cubano]

Google has just released the Google Browser Sync extension for Firefox. This extension allows you to save your bookmarks, history and passwords on Google servers, effectively giving you a 'roaming profile,' which you can sync on any computer running Firefox (and the extension, of course).

For those who are loathe to continue shovelling their personal info at Google ...

scp ~/.firefox/default/<random_letters>/bookmarks.html my_web_host:~/public_html/

Then, from any computer:

wget -O ~/.firefox/default/<random_letters>/bookmarks.html http://mywebhost/bookmarks.html

If the system you are on doesn't have wget, you can just visit the URL and use the links in the browser or save the file to your profile on the machine. If you don't want it so easily accessible on the 'net, then you can use a different file name or put it in some randomly named directory.

Re:For those who are loathe ...

[RedWizzard]

those who are loathe to continue shovelling their personal info at Google ...

Need not get their panties in a bunch - the data is encrypted on the client side.

Re:For those who are loathe ...

[Blakey Rat]

When he says "any computer" he means "any computer except the 95% running Windows." Just clearing that up for you. :)

Re:For those who are loathe ...

[NoMaster]

Yes, because nothing protects your bookmarks more from the prying eyes of the world's biggest web-crawler than dropping "bookmarks.html" into a publicly-viewable web directory...

(I just tried it on your site, Roberto Sanchez; noticed you haven't done it ;-)

Too Late

[Curunir_wolf]

Nice idea, but too late. I keep all my bookmarks on del.icio.us now. It would be nice if they offered a better way to make off-line backups, though.

saved passwords

[Awol411]

it seems a lot like del.ici.ou.us for the bookmarking, but sorry google, i love you, but you're not going to be getting my passwords for anything besides my google account

Trust

[Ajehals]

If you trust Google then this could be great! if you don't then feel free to bash this as a blatant grab for yet more personal data.

Either way you cant say Google aren't pushing to see what users want, and integrating it into whats good for Google. My opinion? I don't know, I like and trust goggle as much as I trust any corporation, but do I want them to have yet more information about me? Probably not. So personally I will give it a miss, although it might be useful in the future, and if it takes off in internet kiosks (and why not) then all the better. It has some serious benefit to people who travel regularly and don't own laptops and PDA's.

Cue the "tin foil hat" posts, closely followed by the "there is no privacy anyway" posts possibly followed by some random "I don't like the new layout" posts.

Re:Trust

[Ajehals]

I'm not so confident - again I trust Google however they do appear to have left themselves with some room for maneuver. I would simply ask whether you would be as confident if Google were taken over by a less scrupilous competitor in 3 months time. - If you read the associated T&C's you will find:
--
3. GOOGLE PRIVACY POLICY
For information about our data protection practices and the data that may be available to Google when you use the Firefox Extensions, please see the Google Privacy Policy at http://www.google.com/privacy.html and the Firefox Extensions Privacy Notices at http://www.google.com/tools/firefox/agreement.html . By using the Extensions, you acknowledge and agree that Google may access, preserve, and disclose information regarding your use of the services if required to do so by law or under other conditions set forth in the Google Privacy Policy http://www.google.com/privacy.html. Google will not be responsible or liable for the exercise or non- exercise of its rights under the Terms of Service.
--
Emphasis mine... So Im sure you could read into that a little - however as I said I do trust Google, however the usual issues apply, and Google may well be leaving themselves access (for the reasons above..). Then from the linked privacy policy:
--
Uses

        * We may use personal information to provide the services you've requested, including services that display customized content and advertising.
        * We may also use personal information for auditing, research and analysis to operate and improve Google technologies and services.
        * We may share aggregated non-personal information with third parties outside of Google.
        * When we use third parties to assist us in processing your personal information, we require that they comply with our Privacy Policy and any other appropriate confidentiality and security measures.
        * We may also share information with third parties in limited circumstances, including when complying with legal process, preventing fraud or imminent harm, and ensuring the security of our network and services.
        * Google processes personal information on our servers in the United States of America and in other countries. In some cases, we process personal information on a server outside your own country.
        * Read more in the full privacy policy.
--
Again emphasis mine, IANAL but that does appear to broaden the scope wouldn't you say? I am not suggesting Google would use this data for their own benefit but it appears they could, up to and including passing it on to a third party.

Spyware

[smokeslikeapoet]

The difference between Google and most big spyware companies is that the Spyware makers promise a valuable service, while Google delivers unobtrusively

I have no problem answering surveys for those mall clipboard guys as long as I'm not in a hurry. I have no problem allowing Google tracking my web habits, as long as I'm getting something valuable, Gmail, Maps, Earth, Search, et. al. in return. When I quit finding their apps useful, I'll rescind my offer to be profiled.

Worried about Privacy? Use Foxmarks instead.

[BrianWCarver]

For those who are worried about giving their browsing history and passwords to Google (or anyone for that matter), you can still reap the benefits of synchronized bookmarks with another Firefox extension: Foxmarks.

Foxmarks is basically the same thing, but just for bookmarks (and not on Google's servers). It's great for keeping bookmarks across multiple machines, and also really useful for those who dual (or triple) boot a single machine. My triple-boot MacBook keeps all its bookmarks in sync with Foxmarks!

Re:Worried about Privacy? Use Foxmarks instead.

[astrosmash]

Does Foxmarks encrypt the data

No.

Foxmarks does nothing to protect your privacy, but that won't prevent the tinfoil hats from citing privacy when offering alternatives to Google. Google, on the other hand, does support encryption, to the effect that your data is stored on their servers in encrypted form and is only decrypted locally using your key.

My passwords trough the windows ?

[Mike Zilva]

I do store localy *some* passwords on my Linux's Firefox, but when I'm not home I don't even login to some websites just cos I don't trust all the software instaled on that machine (including the OS).
How can this extension protect in any way some personal data on forign computers from spywares and viruses? (not to mention they will be on an internet server somewhere)
Maybe I'll use it for the bookmarks, after all it might be very handy ;)

PageRank?

[cashman73]

I can see how they might be interested in the bookmarks and browser history information. This could help augment the PageRank algorithm to possibly cut down on all the scammers trying to increase their PageRank by google-bombing. If they can collect data on what sites people actually visit, based on their own browsers, this would be very useful. Of course, the NSA might want this information, too,... ;-)

Your anti-piracy pledge

[smokeslikeapoet]

By installing the extension you take an anti-piracy pledge:

* defame, abuse, harass, stalk, threaten or otherwise violate the legal rights (such as rights of privacy and publicity) of others;
* upload, post, email or transmit or otherwise make available any inappropriate, defamatory, infringing, obscene, or unlawful Content;
* upload, post, email or transmit or otherwise make available any Content that infringes any patent, trademark, copyright, trade secret or other proprietary right of any party, unless you are the owner of the Rights or have the permission of the owner to post such Content;
* upload, post, email or transmit or otherwise make available messages that promote pyramid schemes, chain letters or disruptive commercial messages or advertisements, or anything else prohibited by law, these Terms of Service or any applicable policies or guidelines.
* download any file posted by another that you know, or reasonably should know, cannot be legally distributed in such manner;
* impersonate another person or entity, or falsify or delete any author attributions, legal or other proper notices or proprietary designations or labels of the origin or source of software or other material;
* restrict or inhibit any other user from using and enjoying Google services;
* use the Extensions for any illegal or unauthorized purpose;
* remove any copyright, trademark or other proprietary rights notices contained in or on the Extensions or any Google services;
* interfere with or disrupt the Extensions or other Google services or servers or networks connected to Google services, or disobey any requirements, procedures, policies or regulations of networks connected to Google services;
* submit Content that falsely expresses or implies that such Content is sponsored or endorsed by Google;
* promote or provide instructional information about illegal activities or promote physical harm or injury against any group or individual; or
* transmit any viruses, worms, defects, Trojan horses, or any items of a destructive nature.

Wow, this should make the world a safer place. I guess I can sleep soundly tonight. How the hell are they going to enforce this?

Great Googley moogley!

[greenguy]

Google is the only search engine I've used in the past, what, four or five years now, and I have a Gmail account that I check constantly. I use the translator to give me ahead start on my translating work. I know about the calculator feature. I use Google Maps all the time. I've checked the spreadsheet out and look forward to GoogleWritely. I look for jobs on Base (anyone need a bilingual CSS coder?). I use the personalized homepage to keep track of the three blogs I run and the 762 that I read every day. I'd use the Page Creator if I wasn't pretty good with Drupal. I've followed the Web Clip links and even a few GoogleAdWords links. At any given time, I have between three and seven tabs open to Google services.

I have just one question. When is it too much of a good thing, privacy or no privacy?

Re:awesome

[krotkruton]

Google making firefox extensions? Maybe I'm retarded, but this is the first I've seen.

Maybe I'm retarded, but that didn't seem sarcastic to me, so here are some other firefox extensions from google. The "beta" (yeah, google loves the beta) version of google toolbar for firefox was released on July 7th, 2005.

Server side settings are nice

[Craig Ringer]

I've long wished that Firefox would support LDAP+TLS or WebDAV+TLS (with client certificates) for storing at least bookmarks, if not history. It's amusing that Google seems to have done it for them - the downside being that I can't use my own servers, I have to use Google. I'll still bite.

To be honest, though, what'd be REALLY exciting would be a similar tool for Thunderbird that enabled a secure writeable server side (pref. LDAP) address book, not just the limited read-only LDAP address book support it currently has. If their calendar app added WebDAV+TLS or HTTPs WebDAV remote calendar storage, it'd start to feel like an app made for people who (*gasp*) use more than one computer.

Maybe Google's move here will show the mozilla folks that people are interested in these features.

You can turn this option off.

[fmobus]

Which I actually did. Currently, I'm storing cookies, passwords, bookmarks and "tabs and windows saving". Bookmarks save works great time, solving conflicts in an elegant fashion: I installed it first at my work's PC (fewer bookmarks) and then at home. I was afraid it would mangle my home collection, but fortunately it merged then folder-by-folder and inside folders. Tabs and windows saving are great too (and yes, I know Opera had this since day zero): it asks you which tabs you want to reload (which is convenient if some of the older tabs were loaded with p0rn).

Great plugin, IMO. A must have, at least for me.

I, for one, welcome our new indexing, synchonizing, mailing, chatting, reading, spreedsheeting and advertising robot overlords!

Buggy!

[XBL]

I tried it on my Windows PC (Firefox 1.5). All of a sudden the menus and URL bar would not work properly. I type in a URL and it takes me to my homepage... I wanted to synch with my Mac mini, and now that machine is locked up where I can't hardly use the mouse, and I can't even close down Firefox! Very weird stuff.

Finally it would not synch anything for me. It kept giving me different errors related to how I have too much data, or to "try again later". Maybe their servers are being hit hard now.

I am uninstalling this stuff, maybe some time in the future I will reinstall when they have fixed the problems...

Googles response

[Freaky Spook]

When I quit finding their apps useful, I'll rescind my offer to be profiled.

I'm sorry Dave, Im afraid I can't do that.

Re:Googles response

[smokeslikeapoet]

touché

Pretty much no security

[Anonymous Coward]

Google says you can encrypt your data with an 8 character password so that "not even Google" can see it [1].

Quick math. 26 lower case letters + 26 upper case + 10 numeric characters. (should cover most users)
62^8 possibilities. Google probably has about 100,000 servers [2], so that's about 2 billion combinations per server [3] - chump change.

AYPABTG.

8 character passwords work because servers can throttle bogus logins - few seconds delay after 3 failed attempts for example. There's very little security against an "adversary" like Google who is able to try all the combinations unabated.

Thanks for playing!

[1] http://www.google.com/tools/firefox/browsersync/fa q.html#q10
[2] http://www.intel.com/cd/ids/developer/asmo-na/eng/ 202679.htm?page=3
[3] http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&q=(62%5E8)% 2F100000

Re:awesome

[tonyr1988]

Just to clarify, this is not the first Google Firefox extension.

http://www.google.com/tools/firefox/index.html

• Google Toolbar
• Google Browser Sync (how relevant.....)
• Blooger Comments
• Send to Phone

They also used to have:

• Google Safe Browsing
• Google Suggest

But they are both incorporated into Google Toolbar now.

It's to protect themselves

[FhnuZoag]

In a word, they won't. The data's encrypted, so there is literally no way they can enforce it.

The 'pledge' is basically legal protection, so that if someone did use the extension to do whatever bad things, (and really, most of them seem pretty impossible to use the extension to do) Google will not themselves be blamed. Realistically, this sort of measure probably won't get them very far in a real court case, but hey, every little helps.

What's the excitement about?

[Omega Blue]

What's all this excitement about? There are already about half a dozen different Firefox extensions in existence that allows you to sync bookmarks. If you ask me I'd tell you to go check out the bookmarks extensions

NSA sue Google

[EEPROMS]

Seen on CNNNN

Today the NSA filed a anti trust suite againt Google inc
When a legal representative of the NSA was questioned about the case he replied, "Our case is based on Googles practice of gathering data in direct competition to the NSA, in such a manner that it's impossible for us to compete".

Our reporter was suddenly arrested before he could question Google on the matter, based on child sex porn bookmarks handed over to legal authorities by google.

You can encrypt everything it can sync

[Dan Berlin]

If you look at the settings, next to every checkbox for "sync this", there is another check box for "encrypt this".
Literally everything it can sync can be encrypted.

Second, it syncs much more than bookmarks.
I for one, enjoy having my history, tabs, and windows saved between the laptop and desktops I work on.

Unfortunate flaw right now

[bogie]

"What does it mean when I see a warning message that tells me "you logged in on a different machine"?
Currently, Google Browser Sync only allows you to be logged in to one browser at a time"

The people would mostly likely use this proably have Firefox on 2 to 3 machines and it is certainly not uncommon to A) leave your computer running with a browser window open and then get on another machine running firefox B) be on firefox on say a laptop while your wife/girlfriend etc is on your main machine(and no they shouldn't all have to have seperate accounts).

I see they are "working" on having multiple accounts but personally this simply won't work for me and many others until then. On the positive side it's nice to have Google developing for Firefox and if the encryption is sound this sounds like a nice feature that maybe one day will become standard on Firefox.

Moving away from the philosophical debate...

[93 Escort Wagon]

... and on to an actual comment about the extension itself.

On my Mac, this extension was rather problematic. It installed just fine, and syncs with Firefox on my Linux box just fine. But when I launch subsequent sessions of Firefox on my Mac, I get one window telling me it's connecting to the Google server - and it overlays (and 95% of the time prevents interaction with) the window that pops up asking for my master password (for FF's saved passwords feature). Can't type my master password, can't get past this point.

In order to actually run Firefox again, I had to manually remove the extension from my profile.

I'm used to Google's "betas" working quite smoothly - it's unusual to run into one with a big old flaw like this one.

Ironically

[StarKruzr]

Personally I have been copying my bookmarks.html to ~/public_html for years.

This is precisely what a "home page" originally was.

Does it even work?

[Gadzinka]

Great tool. Doesn't work for me at all.

When I start it with default config after some thinking it tells me upload too large. try disabling some components and trying again. When I uncheck all the options (i.e. don't save anything) after some thinking it tells me settings change did not complete. please try again later.

As I said, great tool. Doesn't work.

Robert

What does Google get out of this?

[drgonzo59]

Google doesn't do anything if it doesn't benefit Google. They in fact will gain access to everyone's bookmarks. That is one of the most valuable pieces of information they can get, because now they can do very focused, targeting advertising. Also, they will get another way "to pagerank" web pages. If a million people bookmarked Slashdot, SourceForge and PizzaHut, they'll have a good reason to increase the rank of those sites. It seems like a win-win situation to me and smart move on the part of Google.

they've turned evil I tell you!

[bazorg]

With this new tool delivered just a few days after 06/06/06 Google has finally made it clear they turned *E*V*I*L*!!! Want more proof?
this sync extension version number is (gasp) 1.0!!!! Back in the day they were not evil they would never do any product launch that wasn't alpha or beta!

EVIL, I tell you!

(damn, how do I wrap my browser in tinfoil?)

MacBook Pro Issues

[jcm]

Hrmph.

I installed the extension in Firefox v1.5.0.4 on my 15" MacBook Pro running Mac OSX v10.4.6 (fully patched). No go when I try and restart Firefox. The initial startup the extension came up I typed in the configuration information then when it was sending the settings to Google, it just sat there until I did a OpenApple-Q to quit Firefox.

I had to bring Firefox up in safe mode (run "/Applications/Firefox.app/Contents/MacOS/firefox -safe-mode") then remove the extension from the Help Menu->Extensions window. I'll give it another shot here in a bit.

If it weren't for %$*#!! Mozilla...

[Civil_Disobedient]

I'm glad Google has come to the rescue of such a serious oversight on Mozilla's part. They could solve all these portability problems if they just implemented a light database backend to store your data; instead you've got:

1. HTML files (bookmarks)
2. DB files (client certs)
3. CHROME files (browser prefs)
4. TXT files (signons, cookies)
5. DAT files (forms)
6. RDF files (download manager)
7. INI files (extensions)
8. XML files (roaming profiles)
9. JS files (user prefs)
10. et-fucking-cetera

THANK YOU GOOGLE for sorting all this shit out. Too bad it took an "evil-but-not-really" third party to figure out what the end-users have been clamoring on about for years.

And yes, I'm aware that the new, improved Mozilla will implement SQLite. Eventually, when it's released, probably, they think.

Sorry Google, nice try, but I will pass

[TheSkepticalOptimist]

Mozilla took great strides to make Firefox start up quickly, Google ended all that with one simple plug in.

I tried out Google Sync for a few hours, and had to uninstall it. The problem is that I don't want Firefox to take 30 seconds to launch like back in the pre 1.0 days. I also don't want to wait MINUTES for FireFox to exit. Honestly, not once did Google Sync actually finish syncing to its servers as I had to cancel the operation due to lack of patience.

Also, the stupid pop up tool tip that is displayed every time I launch FireFox is annoying. Windows has too many stupid popups, I kind of liked FireFox for being less stupid and annoying with popups.

I don't really need Google Sync either because I use Google homepage. I have all my bookmarks on Google's homepage, and FireFox on all my computers at work and home links to this home page, so technically, its all the SYNC that I need.

Its kind of a neat tool, but unless Google can dramatically improve performance (instant syncing and minimize in browser annoyances), this will be one of those tools from Google I will avoid like the plague (like Google Desktop).

I also have to question the "privacy" of having your history saved on Google Servers and passed around on the Internet between computers. I know its technically encrypted and you can turn it off, but really.