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Execs at AOL Approved Release of Private Data?
reporter writes "The New York Times has published a report providing further details about the release of private AOL search queries to the public. According to the report: 'Dr. Jensen, who said he had worked closely with Mr. Chowdhury on projects for AOL's search team, also said he had been told that the posting of the data had been approved by all appropriate executives at AOL, including Ms. [Maureen] Govern.' The report also identifies the other two people whom AOL management fired: they are Abdur Chowdhury and his immediate supervisor. Chowdhury is the employee who did the actual public distribution of the private search queries. He, apparently, has retained a lawyer."
First they demote him from being a lt. commander. Then they attach him to AOL. Somewhere Lore must be pulling the strings.
Where were you when the voynix came?
At this point, why would you want to stay at your present job if you need a lawyer to keep it... even if you are successful, why would you want to stay, it's obvious you won't be liked by management, since they're trying to get rid of you... Or am I missing something?
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Programming is like sex... Make one mistake and support it the rest of your life.
I thought they were all proud about releasing the data, at first anyway. I seem to recall reading the odd story that spun it that way. Maybe it was just conjecture (journalists are often self-aggrandizing idiots) but it showed up in more than one article, IIRC.
Now they're firing people over it. Isn't that a bit stupid? These people would have been fired on 0-day if they'd been taking liberties to do it.
Almost everything a company does, especially publicly has to have multiple stamps of approval. Can't even order a pencil without paperwork. Right now AOL is headhunting for scapegoats to sacrifice to appease the masses. This had to have nearly everybody OKing it, if it was a mistake it would have gotten yanked back a LOT faster and legal actions would be pending, they aren't threatening anybody yet because they probably don't want their own records being pulled out and becoming massivly liable.
Not at all sure about why they thought it was a good idea, they must have thought the ID numbers were sufficient to conceal identities which also shows the lack of security knowledge most executives have.
Future careers at the DOJ will more than compensate for their troubles.
...a subpoena!
who else would have the phenomenal insight to give us such gems as
l /8-21-06_21.gif
l /8-13-06_26.gif
l /8-21-06_9.gif
http://i.somethingawful.com//sasbi/2006/08/docevi
http://i.somethingawful.com//sasbi/2006/08/docevi
and of course
http://i.somethingawful.com//sasbi/2006/08/docevi
If that's the case, who the hell cares? Admittedly, I'm not a big tinfoil hat-ist anyway, but even if I were this would rate way low on my list of concerns, below the hundreds of ways personally identifiable data about me is being shared.
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
Just because they approved it, it doesn't mean they thouroughly understood how it worked. For example, what if they were told that lists of searches (and results, if I understand this) were going to be released, with user-identifying information hidden? If they weren't told that they were replaced with unique IDs (which could be connected to a person if identifying data were to be entered), then they could not know this without doing a little research. Executives don't just get salaries for making decisions, sometimes they have to do work--but sometimes, they just decide without doing work.
I've completely forgotten what my original point was, so I'll stop here.
I bet they have a stamp that says that.
-Dave
From Mrs. Govern besides pretty much what the Government does with our search queries? Nothing else than this! :D
-ld
...if ever there was any public doubt about how dangerous the release of search query data could be, this should do a lot to prove to "the public" otherwise.
And with this improvement in public awareness of how important it is to have private data safe-guarded and controlled, I think we'll see a little more interest in what business and government does with private data. I think that ultimately, we need to get a LOT more aggressive over the misuse of the SSN (social security number) and forever separate the SSN from the credit and banking systems.
Is anyone else ticked off that the mainstream media is upset that the fact this program was going on was leaked, but they're not upset at the program itself? It's like Bush and the NSA spying on average Americans. How dare the news get out! The guys who released the data did us a favor by pointing out what was going on inside AOL.
And empty suits like the weenies at AOL are just kneejerking to respond to some soccermom who screamed at them at the PTA meeting last night. Heads will roll, I didn't know thanks for your helpful crticism etc etc etc.
Whereas they're probably just mad at someone for forgetting to SELL the information.
WikiSearch anyone? It's about time that people started realizing that these companies are not going to make this easy on anyone. I would gladly pay $5-$10/month to pay for the bills of an open source, accountable search service that doesn't keep so much data on me it makes the Stasi look like amateurs.
I'd retain a lawyer too.
How about...
* Filed lawsuit against former employer due to wrongful termination.
Whatever happened to the "information just wants to be free" argument? Where's that now?
I have read many articles on the analysis of the released AOL data. Some of the articles start off something like this:
..."
"I think the release of this data is a breach of privacy and should never have been made public. But
Then they present their analysis. My question is if you are going to preach on the evils of releasing the data then do you have the moral right to analyze it? I think not.
I'd say this only proves the point - this information wanted to be free badly enough to escape from AOL, leaving a trail of career destruction in its wake!
Today the "little guy's" only defense against being taken advantage of by major corporations and the government is information and the ability to think for himself. A major problem, though, is that even those few trying to think for themselves are at the mercy of the information they are given. That's the information on which they base their decisions. The more corporations and governments know about what we are interested in and find important, the more they can tailor the information we receive to influence in their direction.
Classic marketing and academic research isn't the issue here. The issue is our ability to choose. This is the same reason the Net Neutrality issue matters, because it can directly affect our ability to find good (useful, true) information. Even if these issues weren't considered when the data was released (and I'm sure they were), such sharing of personal data amounts to criminal negligence when caring for other people's quality of life, and yes, lives. Because among the people using this information are people who directly affect our ability to live and yet seem to be driven more by monetary concerns, such as pharmaceutical companies.
Let's see here... we have various free services that are available to everyone on the Internet. These free services aren't free to operate - they cost significant amounts of money to do so. Where does the money come from?
The first place is of course advertising. Having people pay to push their message at the unsuspecting people that are using the service. Eventually the ads become all-pervasive and lose some of their value. Where we are today is that banner ads are almost worthless and Google has made selling text-only ad space the only means of support for many free sites.
The one that a lot of people do not understand is that just the use of the service also has value - and informational value. This information can be collated, organized and distilled and sold. There are people that would like to know how many times the word "Viagra" was searched for on Google. This information is available, for a price. Similarly, Ford would like to know how many people in Indiana search for Toyota, Dodge or Chevy. Again, this is a source of revenue for so-called free services.
What some people posting here do not see to get is that their use of these free services is being tracked and data mined. Some of this is just to keep the service running. It is important to know that when a new album is released by Madonna that everyone will be searching for a way to download it. This can change the resources required to operate a search service. There are similar resource requirement changes in all such systems and the data required to maintain them is certainly being tracked, monitored and used. Some of it is also sold because it has value.
Could there be a search engine or an IM service that didn't data mine or sell ads? Sure, but why would anyone pay $50 a month for a search service if there was one that was free? Some particularly paranoid types might to keep their porn searches private, but the majority would not. The amount of data that can be mined from free services (forums, blogs, search engines, IM systems, etc.) is incredible and as more and better data mining is implemented, the greater value this will have.
Isn't free wonderful?
It looks like nobody is ever going to trust AOL again after this debacle. What a mess for AOL. What a mess for the 200,000 some people whose searches were given to the whole world to look at gleefully and laugh at them. This is so embarassing.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
I'm just waiting until AOL finally curls up and dies. Been waiting for over a decade now...but it seems like the wait may get substantially shorter now.
This sig will self destruct in 5 seconds.
The real problem is that they shouldn't have been keeping it in the first place!
If it can harm a consumer by its release, then it can harm that same consumer by the fact that the have it in their possession in the first place. Just how is AOL that much better or more trustworthy than the world at large?
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
I think you bring up a good point.
As a society, or at least as a subset of one, we need to discuss this. Where should the "expectation of privacy" be when one is using a search engine (or the Internet in general)? It's a very open question.
On one hand, most people I think realize that the query to the search engine is not 'private.' As in, you can go and view at any given time, all the things that are being typed in to Google. (At least you used to be able to, or maybe this was Yahoo.) At any rate, the queries themselves are not secret.
However, what freaks people out is that one query can be associated with another. So if I type in my name, I expect that somebody on the far end knows that I'm searching for my name. However, what people don't expect, is that it's possible to link together all the searches that they've made (potentially across multiple computers, if there's a login system). So that my search for my name today, could be cross-referenced with my search for restaurants in a particular area tomorrow, and cross-referenced further with some street address I search for the day after that.
Individually, only a very naive person would expect a query to be private. However, it's the cross-referenced information sorted by particular users that is concievably private, because it reveals much more than simple queries do.
Let's imagine for instance that AOL had released the same number of searches, but instead of listing the IP address (or a unique identifier that's matched 1:1 with an IP address) they just gave a time/date stamp when it was made. We probably wouldn't be having this conversation, and a few executives would still have their jobs.
Where people expect some sort of privacy (reasonably or not) is in not having one particular "search session" linked to other ones. In fact, I bet that most un-technical people probably think that they can close their browser, and thus 'start over'...not realizing that when they start searching again, it just continues adding to a list of queries from earlier. That "recordkeeping" is where the perceived invasion occurs, not in the lack of secrecy of the terms themselves.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
Pope Catholic.
Bear craps in woods.
Telecom companies can do a lot of this stuff just as well, if not better than google and they are getting paid quite well. That does not stop them from selling your name to spamlists, or selling phone records to government spies.
There is a moral bankruptcy in this society that ensures that anything goes as long as you get what you want and can get away with it. Individuals have no strength or bargaining power to defend themselves against corporate predation, except by not using the service.
Until people start balking at bad TOSes en masse, there can be no change. Unfortunately, most individuals feel that as long as they get what they want, there is no need to make a fuss.
Children? After reading some of those search queries it's the dogs I'm worried about.
Doesn't it make you feel good to know that our freedoms are protected by politicans, lawyers and journalists.
No, actually they hoped for even more money this way.
See, just selling email addresses to the spammers doesn't actually bring _that_ much money. See the AOL idiot who exported the database and sold it to spammers. He's got, I think, some tens of thousands of dollars. That's small change for a corporation.
Even if they sold it together with the search keywords, how much do you think they'd get? Hundreds of thousands? Let's even be generous and say a couple of millions? Those guys have to think of their own profit, so don't think you'll get all their advertising money for the next decade. That's hardly worth the effort.
No, if you want to maximize your income, the way to go is to do the keyword matching _yourself_. See: Google.
So excuse me if I don't think that AOL did some noble altruistic act, out of sheer generosity towards the academia. It was a desperate "someone please please please kill Google for us" act, and they stand to gain a _lot_ more if it actually works. Maybe they packed it in some PR double-speak to sound like some kind act, so they'd get their public image polished too in the process, but rest assured that even that wasn't the primary motivation. It was about long term money, plain and simple.
And to that end, they had no qualms with raping their users' privacy. If it hadn't been so hare-brained and hadn't backfired, rest assured that the same CTO would now be getting a big fat bonus as a reward.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
There's got to be a morning after If we can hold on through the night We have a chance to find the sunshine Let's keep on lookin' for the light Oh, can't you see the morning after? It's waiting right outside the storm Why don't we cross the bridge together And find a place that's safe and warm? It's not too late, we should be giving Only with love can we climb It's not too late, not while we're living Let's put our hands out in time There's got to be a morning after We're moving closer to the shore I know we'll be there by tomorrow And we'll escape the darkness We won't be searchin' any more
If I had any mod points left, parent would definitely be +1 Funny...
web front-end to search the 2gb log file http://czern.homeip.net/aolsearch/
If she floats, she's a witch.
Sending a few lambs to slaughter won't change the direction of the flock. If all the execs and management of this company were completed different people, the same decision would have been made.
Did anyone really think this wasn't a preplanned action by AOL? They probably thought everyone would think they are cool and they could get recognition from releasing this. Of course, it back fired and everyone hates AOL more than ever.
And the solution is to stop trusting these guys and use your own head. Heres a good way to do just that with a search proxy.
http://www.blackboxsearch.com/
Reminds me of the Simpsons episode where the town splits along the new area codes- Homer (after seeing a telephone companies promotional video): I accuse the phone company of making that video...ON PURPOSE!
Here is an example. The post above yours (threaded) has three links to some interesting examples of this data. The last one is a rather strange fellow who seems to like the idea of dogs and women together. He has a few other rather strange ideas as well. Obviously AOL did not release this data with their identifiers, but if you look at the full listing of this users history, it also shows the following lines:
9550729 bouie elementary school teacher exposed by nbc news
9550729 do female elementary school teachers get sexually aroused by their pre-teen male students
9550729 do female elementary school teachers get sexually aroused by their pre-teen male students
9550729 story on mr. mula the bouie elementary school teacher accused of assaulting a student
9550729 teacher at bouie elementary school in dekalb county accused of pushing a student
There are also other questions about similar locations. Now, it is getting interesting as this LOOKS like an identifiable teacher reading about child porn and checking search engines to see if his past is haunting him. It may very well be the case that Mr Mula is just an interest of his and this is out of context, but it would be worth looking into.
I hope that pedophiles are outed with this data, but there are going to be lots of innocents who are also caught up in it. For instance if you once looked up jihad and then looked up your name, you might get a tap on the shoulder one day. Of course investigators will be able to look at logs anyway, but there are a lot more eyes looking on this one.