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Clandestine Operations at Google

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the spooks-at-the-goog dept.

eldavojohn writes "The San Francisco Chronicle is running an interesting story about Google's involvement with the CIA, NSA, NOAA and several other agencies. This has been speculated before although now Google seems to have several contracts open with several agencies. From the article, "When the nation's intelligence agencies wanted a computer network to better share information about everything from al Qaeda to North Korea, they turned to a big name in the technology industry to supply some of the equipment: Google Inc. The Mountain View company sold the agencies servers for searching documents, marking a small victory for the company and its little-known effort to do business with the government. 'We are a very small group, and even a lot of people in the federal government don't know that we exist,' said Mike Bradshaw, who leads Google's federal government sales team and its 18 employees.""

5 of 166 comments (clear)

  1. Clandestine? by kevin_conaway · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I don't see anything clandestine about a software/hardware company providing software/hardware solutions to the Federal government, especially when said information is printed in a nationally recognized newspaper and linked on a major news aggregator.

    It seems more like an opportunity to get the Google haters and rumor mongers fired up.

  2. "interesting story" = "warmed over press release"? by xxxJonBoyxxx · · Score: 4, Insightful

    (some newspaper) is running an interesting story about (some company)'s involvement with (government)... From the (original press release), "When the (government) wanted a (product with extensive capabilities), they turned to (company) because (pitch). '...a lot of people in the (target market) don't know that we exist,' said (sales exec), who leads (some company's) government sales team...""


    "interesting story" = "warmed over press release"? Zzzzz.....
  3. Re:Do no evil? by ScentCone · · Score: 5, Insightful

    If the NSA can get to Google

    You mean... with a purchase order? To buy search appliances? Just like they also buy air conditioning equipment, sandwiches, and carpeting?

    Have they redefined "treason" as well?

    Right, because being a vendor to federal IT users is ... treason!

    How do you even function, day to day, behind all of that tinfoil? I mean, doesn't it get hot and itchy after a while?

    --
    Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
  4. Slashdot post is flamebait by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful
    For the most part, this slashdot thread is flamebait. Google, like Oracle, IBM, Microsoft, RedHat, Novell, AT&T, and most other large corporations work with and sell to the US Government. How many government databases are on Oracle? How about Oracle+RedHat or Oracle + SUSE. Does this make Oracle evil? RedHat evil? This is mostly not news.


    Google is the best in search (currently). They provide appliances that can be used on closed networks (for example classified). There are MANY applications for these devices. The US Government is a BIG customer and can be a good partner. Despite what you may read here, not all the US Government does is evil....

  5. Trickledown by pragma_x · · Score: 4, Insightful

    As far as I can tell, there's no reason to label this as "clandestine". It looks to me like GOOG is just doing what publicly held businesses do: make money and court the biggest customers they can.

    The upshot to this is that this is one place where the Federal government at large actually provides something for the public good, even if it is a few steps removed from joe sixpack. Since the NSA has some of the most stringent security requirements outside of most casinos, they're likely to push Google to improve their products in ways the rest of us can't. Take Net BSD for example. Anyway, that's likely to trickle down to the rest of us in the form of a more robust line of Google appliances and more. Another possibility is that Google may also have to learn how to become more nimble as a company in order to meet tougher requirements for Government-contract volume, reliability and ease-of-handling-red-tape. Again, that can work out for everyone.

    The downside is that throwing Google style power at large, parallelizable computing tasks, might send us rocketing down a rather slippery slope if it were used for less-than-legal *coughATTcough* purposes. Yea, we're all tempted to file that one under "-1 No Duh", but I think it bears mentioning all the same.