Google Faces Privacy Audits For Next 20 Years

Hugh Pickens writes "The San Francisco Chronicle reports that Google has reached a settlement with the Federal Trade Commission over Buzz, a social blogging service the company introduced through Gmail last year. The deal will require that Google have regular, independent privacy audits for the next 20 years. Buzz drew heavy criticism at launch in February 2010 for a glaring privacy flaw. When users turned it on, it suggested people to follow based on their Gmail contacts list and their most frequent email partners. 'Although Google led Gmail users to believe that they could choose whether or not they wanted to join the network, the options for declining or leaving the social network were ineffective,' says the FTC. Along with the 20 year oversight, the settlement also says that Google is barred from misrepresenting privacy or confidentiality of the user information it collects, Google must obtain user consent before sharing their information with third parties if it changes its privacy policy, and Google must establish and maintain a comprehensive privacy program."

Comments

Re:Good

[JoeMerchant]

In 1995 AT&T tried to change (triple) their rates on me without prior notice "your bill is your notice, sir" as I recall. I demanded a copy of the agreement I signed that said they could do that - they never produced one, though several years later they did send me a "change of terms" notice that included the ability for them to change their rates with only notification via checking their website, "payment of your bill indicates agreement with these terms."

Damn collection company called me at work, just once.