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Google Consolidates Privacy Policies Across Services
parallel_prankster writes "The Washington Post reported Tuesday that Google will require users to allow the company to follow their activities across e-mail, search, YouTube, and other services; a radical shift in strategy that is expected to invite greater scrutiny of its privacy and competitive practices. The information will enable Google to develop a fuller picture of how people use its growing empire of Web sites. Consumers will have no choice but to accept the changes. The policy will take effect March 1 and will also impact Android mobile phone users. 'If you're signed in, we may combine information you've provided from one service with information from other services,' Alma Whitten, Google's director of privacy, product, and engineering, wrote in a blog post."
The angle of the Washington Post article is a bit negative; Google sees this as consolidating an absurd number of privacy policies for its various services into a single, unified document. Reader McGruber adds: "Donald E. Graham, the Washington Post's chairman and CEO, joined Facebook's Board of Directors in January 2009. Curiously, the Washington Post article neglects to disclose that."
I think this is a great idea for both users and the company. Users have only a single place that they have to go to for their privacy concerns. Likewise for the company they only have to have corporate counsel review one privacy policy instead of several. The company saves money and the consumer saves hassle.
Note that I'm only talking about the idea of consolidating the privacy policies themselves. I am not talking about the merit of whether or not the privacy policy is a good one or not.
I actually assumed they already did this (used your email to determine what ads you saw on search and such).
Either way, personally it doesn’t bug me too much. If they were selling the information it might.. but as long as they keep it in house and it’s all being processed by automated algorithms I’ve got no qualms.
That’s not to say I don’t recognize other people might have issues with this, and I definitely don’t subscribe to the whole “if you have nothing to hide” nonsense. This is just my personal view. Some people want privacy and they don’t (nor should they) need a reason.
is that people are surprised or even upset about this.
Google is an ad company, nothing more. Of course they're going to grub for every last iota of personal information they can -- it's what they do.
People need to wake up and realize there is no "free" service. Google provides things that cost them substantial dollars to create and maintain but users do not directly pay for. Your information is what you trade for Google's services. No one is forced or coerced into using Google's services. There are alternatives out there that you can pay for and expect lock your privacy down.
It is no different than anything else. There is a restaurant in town I will not go to because their service is pitiful. I refuse to support their model with my dollars. If you don't like Google's practices, you are free to take your private information to another email/search/whatever provider.
Of course most of this is wasted thought, because many of those complaining about Google violating their privacy just updated their location from their phone, posted what they had for breakfast on Facebook, and tweeted details of their morning bowel movement.
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I have to be signed in to be able to disable as much of the personalization crap as possible to have some semblance of the Google that I used to love. Also to subscribe in Youtube and view 18+ videos.
What I don't want is them changing anything I enter or changing what I see based on anything about me. But they are bound and determined to do exactly that.
I don't want to be helped. Show me ads relevant to content, but leave me out of it.
Sure I have a choice - I can buy myself out of my mobile phone contract and pay the early termination fees (which is the monthly tariff times the number of months left on the contract, several hundred pounds) and get a non-Android based phone, or I can put up with it.
Not much of a choice if you ask me.
It's official. Most of you are morons.
You must be one of my followers.
English is not this
In a shock revelation this morning, journalists from McGruber "but I haven't told you where my interests lie" Inc. have uncovered credible information that doctors - professionals who spend much of their time administering advice, medication and surgery to sick people - also make money from providing these services. A spokesperson for doctors has been consulted to ask her why it is that all sentences uttered by doctors do not include a clear and explicit statement of this obvious conflict of interest.
Professor of Internet Argument Steve Meretzky at the University of Life states, "We have no idea why doctors have gone so long without admitting this. It opens them up to immediate defeat by ad hominem and a warm, smug glow on the face of the other party." The Professor then suggested that the warm, smug glow could be reinterpreted by doctors as a sign of illness and used to sell patients more unnecessary healthcare.
Rep. Simon Schama (DR., Washingwa), promises to next week propose a bill requiring all doctors to explain to their patients how jobs work. "You can trust me," he explains, "because made a campaign promise during the last election that I would only accept campaign contributions from the media industry, but not the medical industry."
We look forward to updating readers on progress in the legislature.
Google's new unprivacy policy sucks.
In what way? I'm not saying it doesn't; I have no idea what the issues are or are claimed to be. Just saying that there's one policy now instead of many before doesn't seem to be a problem - in fact it increases the chance that a user can take the time to understand the policy that applies. Does it allow disclosure of data that wasn't permitted before? Or use by staff who wouldn't have had access before? What are the actual changes in policy language that achieve this?
This isn't a change in Google's policy, or practice. Google has long collected information about all of its users, and used that information for targeted advertising. Those of us who think about things realized long ago that Google has tremendous visibility into our on-line activities and is smart enough to be able to extract a lot of information about us. All that's happening here is that Google is making this fact more visible to users by condensing dozens of long privacy policy documents written in legalese into one short, understandable document. According to their blog entry, Google is also going to be doing a lot of advertising to make sure that everyone is aware of the policy document.
In the short term, I think Google is going to suffer from a lot of backlash from users who are frightened by the explanation of what Google collects about them, but I think this is a really positive move by Google and I hope it spurs other on-line service providers to follow suit. If you're going to collect and use personal information about people, telling them what you're collecting and how you're using it, and doing so in a way that is easy to understand is the right thing to do. Spending money on a media blitz to make sure that everyone knows how you're watching them is going above and beyond.
Google's policy document also contains a link to Google's privacy tools, which make it easy for users to see what Google is tracking about them and to opt out if they don't want to be tracked. It's potentially risky for Google to advertise that to large numbers of people, but again it's the right thing to do. Google's theory is that when given the ability to make an informed choice, people will see enough value in the search personalization and even targeted advertising that they'll be okay with it.
I guess the truly selfless thing to do would be to make all of Google's tracking opt-in, rather than opt-out, but that's probably too much to hope for -- and it may even be that the world is better off this way, because if Google is right about the value of mass personalization we'd probably never know because hardly anyone will opt in. This way, it's possible that large numbers of people will opt out, but not the majority. In any case, making it all opt in would almost certainly be very damaging to Google's business. The current approach is significantly less risky, but still enables people to limit their privacy exposure if they wish.
[Disclaimer: I'm a Google engineer. I work on the security of systems that process payments to/from Google, though, not on anything related to personal information tracking or privacy (other than I do work really hard to make sure users' payment instruments are well-protected, even from me). These opinions are my own, and based on Google's public statements not on inside information.]
Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
You could always Opt-Out
http://www.google.com/ads/preferences/html/intl/en/plugin/
We are Dead Stars looking back Up at the Sky
Alright: the article says two things:
Now, the billion dollar question: the second point is a surprise to me and probably 99% of the people here. Why? Because I pretty much thought Google already did that. I mean, why wouldn't they? When I'm on GMail and Google Maps and Google Plus I have a big bar on the top of the screen reminding me I'm logged into the Google.
Is it evil? Well, depends really on what they do with that information. If they make an agreement with Blue Cross Blue Shield that anyone searching for the words "Cancer symptoms" will automatically have their name, address, and social security number sent to blacklist@bcbs.com, then yeah. If, on the other hand, they use it so that ads.google.com/showad.pl?customer=wb serves an ad for "Underworld" because you watched all the vampire shows on Youtube, received email from someone called "megagoth@yahoo.com", and did a Google images search for "women in black latex catsuits", then so what?
And there's the rub. We pretty much know what Google does with this information. It's using it to select ads for us to see. I can see how collecting data enables Google to do evil, but I don't think collecting data requires Google do evil. Google can keep the information private, and use it to provide a service that's useful for advertisers and, to some extent, advertisees alike. That's not evil. And to the best of my knowledge (that is, nobody's reported evidence of the contrary) that's what Google does.
I really don't see this as being anything other than another fake controversy covering a company that's made a lot of enemies lately.
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
google is the NSA's bitch
Right. The NSA cares about which You Tube video you watch. It cares about which dodgy web site you go to (the ones with the midgets AND the horses). They care that you spend hours looking at DD bra advertisements.
Give it up. Nobody cares about you. I don't. Your mom doesn't and the NSA certainly doesn't.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
Don't use Google for everything.
Probably the most personal information you're giving away is via search and e-mail, and they're the simplest ones to get from different providers. e.g. keep using gmail, but switch to Bing for search, or keep using Google search and switch to someone else for web mail.
For video there's no real choice other than Google, so just make sure that you're not logged in if you're viewing something you don't want to be tracked and associated with your other Google services.
I'm a bit surprised at some of the comments along the lines of "no biggie - I assumed they were doing this already.... This really does make a difference. For example if you previously limited your Google searches.to stuff you wouldn't mind your girlfriend/children/co-workers or whoever seeing as suggested search completions, but weren't so careful on youtube, now you have to worry about that... You'll be getting google search completions popping up on your screen based on your youtube viewing habits! Not so harmless, eh?
I already opt out of everything new they've been doing as possible. However they appear to be determined to alter what I see based on my actions, "helping" me.
It's already marginal as to what I'm able to opt out of, and it's rapidly getting worse. Their vision of internet utopia doesn't match mine.
Yes but will you now admit that "do no evil" is no different and just as much bullshit as "think different" or "What do you want to do today?" (had to go look that last one up, wow MSFT sucks at catch phrases don't they?) because all three are NOTHING but marketing BS. If Google could make an extra 15% by throwing a random Google user into a pit of horny gorillas i have no doubt we'd be seeing gorilla loving on YouTube before the day was out. it doesn't matter HOW a company starts out once they get to a certain level there is simply too large and powerful an org there to be controlled by some silly catch phrase, no different than how Apple is nothing like that garage that Woz and Jobs hand built the first boards in.
What scares me isn't this so much as i expected this would be coming, but the quite disturbing 'treat corporations like ballclubs' complete with cheering and booing. These companies aren't FOR you, hell the ballclubs aren't FOR you as khan let slip with his "I only care about season ticket holders" gaffe, so cheering and booing these corps is not only stupid but more than a little dangerous because it gives these corps more power. If congress started investigating Google how many letters do you think would be wrote telling them to /slips blanket over head/ "Leave poor Google alone" do you think? Tens of thousands? Hundreds of thousands? as the economies of the world continue to sour these corps are gonna get nastier folks, once they are used to making X profits they simply aren't gonna settle for X-Y which is why we got the *.A.As pushing SOPA/PIPA because god forbid they don't meet the quarterly earnings reports, so please, judge companies by their douchebag behavior, not some marketing slogan.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
That's not a privacy policy! That's a voyeurism policy.
Give me my freedom, and I'll take care of my own security, thank you.
Facebook, and increasingly Google, ARE personal information vendors. Compiling your personal information and selling it to advertisers, or the promise that they will be able to do this in the future, are the basis for their market cap.
Of course they log you as a customer... have you ever used your credit card number to buy food? You got logged in their accounts receivable. It may not be your email address, but they can get in contact with you via that number. It may be a layer of abstraction, but technically so is a SPAM filter.
Every time I start to have faith in humanity, I ruin it by driving to work between 7 and 8 am.
>>>It's the world's greatest Blackmail Engine.
Also government spy resource and censorship: âoeUS government authorities called for the removal of 113 videos from YouTube, including several documenting alleged police brutality which Google refused to take down..... The reason listed for the removal of one You Tube video in one instance is âoegovernment criticismâ. The exact identity or content of the video is not divulged. The report states that the removal requests pertaining to âoepolice brutalityâ were done on the grounds of âoedefamationâ.....
"The number of âoeItems requested to be removedâ by US authorities was almost seven-fold the number requested to be removed by Chinese authorities, a country much maligned for its Internet censorship policies....."
"These figures illustrate how governments, particularly the United States and Britain, are getting more aggressive in pushing for web censorship as the state increasingly tries to strangle the last bastion of true free speech, the Internet"
http://www.infowars.com/feds-order-you-tube-to-remove-video-for-containing-government-criticism/
My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
Didn't you ever think they are not bothered if they know your real name or not, the adverts they target at Hick Dead are just as relevant to you anyway, assuming that what you view on utube, google or have in your inbox reflect your views and purchasing decisions
Cell phone companies lock you into multi-year contracts. Since Google is including Android in all of this and tells people if they don't like it, don't use the service, does that mean I can cancel my cell phone contract without early termination fees? Otherwise, my carrier is forcing me to divulge information that was not part of my original agreement with the carrier!
That's not so. If you have an Android phone, which Google includes in this new policy, you are giving away your location, who you call, what you search for via the phone, etc. etc. If you phone has the facebook app, then Google also has access to all of that data.
The courts just said that the police can't use a gps device without a court order. Google just change their privacy policy to allow them to track you via your phone wherever you go.
That's not actually true. There's a box you can uncheck on the initial signup page that allows you to opt out of creating a profile, and, further, even if you create one, you can immediately delete it.
But yes, Slashdot did report, falsely, that very allegation earlier today, and it rather emphasizes my point: a lot of bogus negative stories about a company that's made a lot of enemies lately.
Can we limit criticizing Google to things it actually does, for example, it's awful search engine?
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
Sweet! Where on Google can I buy (your) personal information?
I accept that Google tracks what I'm doing while logged into one of their systems and I've installed their plugin to make sure they don't track me when I'm *not*. But I was never under the impression that everything will be combined into a single identity and I don't trust that they would ONLY use such information for targeted advertising both now and in the future.
I don't want what I watch on Youtube associated with my email. I don't want documents I open in Google documents to have a history with my digital self. This is too close to a single, universal, Internet Identification program and we have stated many, many times that we do NOT want this. We have separated persona for different reasons for specific reasons. OUR reasons.
I don't want Google's "your world search" giving me biased results because I'm subscribed to a couple newsgroups or because I watched 3 back to back videos from the same band on Youtube.
Google has gone too far. When they merged GoogleAccounts with Youtube, I cancelled my Youtube account and never went back to the proper site. Last night, I started backing up everything in my Gmail account with Thunderbird and pulled everything from my Google Docs account. As of today, I'm not turning on my Asus Transformer (Android) until there's a friendly Ubuntu Tablet Edition installer.
I'm open to suggestions about where to go from here. I need online webmail that will "Do no Google."
Who has suggestions?
Just treat their services as separate companies. Use different e-mail addresses to register Google+, YouTube, Gmail, whatever else you use. Use that one thing and then close your browser (with 'delete cookies when closing' checked).
I'm pretty sure they wouldn't use the IP address to identify you, especially with so many people accessing behind work NAT. With dial-up going away, people are holding on to an IP longer, but it's not guaranteed.
I actually have 2 youtube accounts. One is the one where I watch funny stuff, the other is for music/arts. That way the recommendations are pretty good. Random articles get the anonymous visitor. Sign in, watch a playlist, close the browser. I even use different browsers, like GMail uses Chrome, YouTube gets FireFox.
They want to track me, to sell things to me. I want them to know I'm not a single person, I have different preferences depending on the day or what mood I'm in. I figure I'm being more honest with them than most people are, even if they think I'm 3 or 4 different people.
You're not correct. And THAT is where the big difference between Google and Facebook lies. Google sells eyes, but the fact of the matter is that they are anonymous eyes, but sold as eyes belonging to people most likely to purchase the product being marketed. However, until you click on that link, all the company knows is that they've been matched to you by the black box of Google magic.
Facebook, on the other hand, shares information with "partners". They are BY DEFINITION a personal info vendor.
Google sells ads, and tailors them to the vendor. Facebook sells your data to the vendor directly. BIG difference in privacy implications.
The problem with the argument that Google isn't doing evil with this data, "it's just advertising, what's the problem?", is that you are placing an awful lot of trust in an organisation that has little invested in keeping you happy. When the day comes (as it may) that Google uses your information in a way that you don't like, it will be too late. The data will be out of the bottle. You can leave any time you like, but you can't take it with you.
This is why anyone with any sense maintains multiple Google accounts for their different services That way email doesn't get cross referenced with android apps, cross referenced with Youtube subscriptions, cross referenced with googling.
That can be a headache to keep track of, and they can probably draw their own conclusions based on IP numbers. But it's one way of fighting back against the insidious integration of the entire internet into a single account that google can tattoo onto your (virtual) forehead for their own convenience.
Bullshit. No one has to have a Google account.
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
what if someone else is on gmail and refuses to switch?
it's not like google only gets to see their sent mail, you know.
who in the slashdot organization has google stock, because every story on this site about google invariably spins positive for google
google is the new microsoft. it really is
yet the standard prejudices here on slashdot about microsoft and google on this site seem to be stuck in 2001
(now mod me troll for not towing the slashdot party line)
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Only having one policy will make it easier. It's not like it allows then to get something they can't already.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Android phone contracts.
Visits to any site with google analytics at home, work and from mobile.
Use of youtube, including embedded videos.
Use of google docs at work.
No, you really can't use the internet without coming into contact with Google.
Check your premises.
Yes, the MAY know it's the same computer.. maybe. they still don't know anything about YOU.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
You can already buy consumer data analytics systems with fancy GIS based interfaces that allow you to click on an individual house and pull up hundreds of records. What type of movies they watch, how old they are, what prescription drugs they do (or might) take, who employs them, what types of purchase they make, psychographic profiles, etc. They pull from hundreds of public and private data sources, then consolidate and geocode *everything*. Bob Jones likes to buy hydroponics supplies and glass pipes, laxatives and My Little Ponies. Sally Fields apparently collects Chia Pets. I suppose it's fine when just advertisers and marketers are using this stuff, but it gets real creepy when it moves beyond that.
I'm fine with customized ads from Google, but I want it de-identified and siloed as much as possible and not linked across services. Not being a lawyer, I dunno how privacy policies and EULAs translate in this circumstance, but it's easy for me to imagine a hypothetical bankruptcy fire sale of Google assets in which their data was made available to these consumer data warehouses.
The applications for this stuff are in their infancy, but it's very easy to imagine a scary future. Do I really want my state child protective services cross referencing households with children with households of, I dunno, atheists? Or the DEA looking up all the aforementioned buyers of grow lights? Or my city cross referencing the purchases of plumbing supplies with people who pulled permits to try to find building code violators? Or some loony group like Westboro Baptist Church publishing some kind of index of the best people to target for harassment or worse? Or employers building enormous psychological profiles of all their employees to try to weed out the subversive types?
After this policy change, you can't Opt Out anymore. IF you read the article you would know this.