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Google Deleting Private Profiles

Posted by samzenpus on from the out-of-the-shadows dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Google announced that it will no longer support private Google Profiles after July 31. The move comes as Google is rolling out its latest social experiment, Google+. Those who have already been admitted to Google+ will see their Google+ profiles replace their Google Profiles. At the moment the only information Google requires users to reveal is their name and gender."

3 of 312 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Consciously opt out? by cychoi · · Score: 5, Informative

    How do I opt out of Google+?

    https://plus.google.com/u/0/downgrade/

  2. Paranoia much? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Unlike some of the comments here state, Google+ does *not* make all of your stuff public the second you enter it. For each field that you fill in there is a box that states (initially) "Everyone on the web", once you've filled in the field you get the chance to chance every bit of profile information and decide exactly who it goes to. With your real name for example you can choose to share it with everyone, only people in your circles, people in extended circles (friends of friends), with a specific circle i.e. family only or work colleagues only or you can choose to keep it completely private, or you can just not fill it in. As stated in TFA there are only 2 pieces of info you are *required* to give. If you're that paranoid you can make your nickname public or just to IRC friends for example so you know they'll get a piece of info that they can identify you by but not the rest of it.

    It's really a great system in my opinion, I love the flexibility and fine-grained settings, miles better than Facebook.

    Also for the record this: "When you join Google+, your profile is already public to the whole internet and search engines. And because it's Google, they have already indexed it by then. There is no way to set it private before it's already public." is complete crap as the settings I mentioned above are applied before you even hit the "Save changes" button on the profile page.

    At least take the time to learn about the thing you're publicly slating, though this is slashdot so I guess you can't expect any actual facts here anymore.

    1. Re:Paranoia much? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      There's a difference between the USA and Europe. In Europe, companies are not allowed to sell your data on to other people, and it must be used for the purpose it was provided. Europeans feel extremely and personally threatened by the US attitude of "All your information is open, and everyone knows about you".

      The "Default deny" mindset is deeply ingrained in the European mindset, due to the violent history of the continent. It's Darwinian: In times of war, loose lips will get you killed.