Google Patents Guilt-By-Association

theodp writes "Guilt by association is defined as the attribution of guilt (without proof) to individuals because the people they associate with are guilty. It's also at the heart of U.S. Patent No. 8,306,922, which was awarded to Google on Tuesday for Detecting Content on a Social Network Using Links, the invention of three Googlers. In its patent application, Google argues that if an individual posts content to social networks such as Facebook, MySpace, Orkut, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, etc. 'that is illegal (e.g., content violating copyright law, content violating penal statutes, etc.), inappropriate for minors (e.g., pornography, "R" or "NC-17" rated videos, adult content, etc.), in contravention of an end user licensing agreement (EULA), etc.', then their friends 'may be likely to post content to their profile pages related to similar topics.' Google further explains: 'For instance, a first user and a second user that are designated as friends on a social network may be friends based upon a set of common interests (e.g., the first user and the second user are both interested in tennis). If the first user adds content to its profile page that is related to sports, then the friendship (link) between the first user and the second user can indicate that the profile page of the second user is likely to contain content related to sports as well.' By extension, the same holds true for porn, pirated videos and music, etc., right? So, would you feel comfortable being judged by the online company you keep?"

Comments

This is simply collecting existing data

[DaTrueDave]

I don't see how it does anything to indicate someone's guilt or innocence. Can it detect trends and probabilities that should be investigated? Sure, but so does a 24-hour tip-line where anyone can call and report suspicious activity.

This is just a tool that can be used and abused by law enforcement, just like their guns, their search warrants and their overall authority. Society has to give them a certain level of trust to fulfill the duties that we expect of them. Sure, sometimes we get burned. There are bad apples everywhere. But reining in the authority that law enforcement is entrusted with is OUR JOB, not theirs. We, as voters and taxpayers, are responsible for electing representatives who will determine the level of authority that law enforcement gets to use to enforce the law.

Re:This is simply collecting existing data

[Anonymous Coward]

It's also at the heart of U.S. Patent...awarded to Google on Tuesday for Detecting Content on a Social Network...

Look, we've been over this again and again. Don't fucking social network. Are you really that starved for attention and distraction, that you have no friends you could call or text, that you're willing to give up what little privacy you have for 1,000 fake friends?

Anybody who didn't learn those lessons during the MySpace days should be smacked in the mouth with a rolled-up newspaper.

-- Ethanol-fueled

Re:This is simply collecting existing data

[RenderSeven]

8427 attention-starved people +1 LIKED your shallow narcissistic plea for affirmation

Re:This is simply collecting existing data

[jellomizer]

Police can just check your garbage to collect a lot more clues on your life.
The problem with these sites it is near impossible to track everyone to make sure they are playing by the rules. However if you can filter down your rules to a smaller set than you can probably run more efficient. Sure if your friend posts a nasty pic, you may be on the watch list. It doesn't mean they are going to kick you off just because you made a watch list.

However just like in real life, if your friend is a known criminal, chances are you are going to be watched too. You won't get arrested if you do legal things, however you will be under more scrutiny

Re:This is simply collecting existing data

[SJHillman]

I misread that as "Species 8472 +1 LIKED your shallow narcissistic plea for assimilation"

Re:This is simply collecting existing data

[stanlyb]

You mean, now i am guilty because i just read your post???

Re:This is simply collecting existing data

[jedidiah]

It's already been done before. I worked on a system in 2001 that did this sort of thing. This seems like little more than one of those "but on the internet" kinds of patents that seem so prevalent these days.

Replace "but on the internet" with "but on social media".

Re:This is simply collecting existing data

[Culture20]

Even the one where the Enterprise crew teams up with Satan? (No, I'm not kidding)

Re:This is simply collecting existing data

[dinfinity]

It's pretty hard to hang out with somebody and not know they're a drug dealer.
It's pretty easy to have 400 'friends' on a social network and have no fucking idea where they currently live, work or how they spend their days.

Statistics

[Nerdfest]

So,they've managed to patent using statistics? Is anyone actually doing their job in the patent office?

Re:Statistics

[alphatel]

So,they've managed to patent using statistics?

No, they patented labeling every teenager as a marijuana user - by association of course.

Re:Statistics

[Dachannien]

No, actually, they patented this:

A computer-implemented method comprising:

receiving at a first server system information related to users of a social network site hosted on a second server system;

determining by the first server system a social network graph for at least a portion of the social network from the received information, the graph comprising a plurality of nodes connected by links, each node corresponding to a user that is registered with the social network and that has a profile page on the social network;

identifying first nodes from the plurality of nodes as including content associated with a particular subject of interest;

seeding the identified first nodes with first scores that indicate profile pages for the identified first nodes are positively identified as including content associated with the particular subject of interest;

determining second scores for second nodes of the plurality of nodes based on propagation of the first scores from the first nodes to the second nodes using the links of the social network graph, where:

          each of the determined second scores corresponding to a second node indicates a likelihood that a profile page for the second node contains content associated with the particular subject of interest,
          a particular second score for a particular second node is determined based on a combination of scores for neighboring nodes that are connected to the particular second node by one or more of the links, and
          a particular profile page that is associated with the particular second node is determined to have at least a threshold likelihood of containing content that is associated with the particular subject of interest when at least a portion of the scores for the neighboring nodes exceed a threshold score; and

providing by the first server system the determined second scores for the second nodes.

If you're dissatisfied with that, put your money where your mouth is, and join us. Currently, the available listings require someone with an engineering Ph.D. or equivalent industry experience, but we will probably have openings for people with 4-year engineering degrees soon.

Re:Statistics

[Idbar]

Oh well... I'm just really sorry for Kevin Bacon, that guy is going to have a hard time defending himself in court.

Re:Statistics

[Nerdfest]

It's a little obvious, don't you think? If you described the problem to someone involved in the field, they couldn't come up with this? On the plus side, it does actually describe an implementation, which seems to be better than a lot of the 'software' patents we see.

Re:Statistics

[dywolf]

Seems to me like patenting behaviour, and judgements based on it.

Either way. More proof the USPTO needs complete rebuilding.

Re:Statistics

[Theaetetus]

It's a little obvious, don't you think? If you described the problem to someone involved in the field, they couldn't come up with this?

That's like saying "he's a little guilty, don't you think? I mean, look at him, isn't he guilty looking?"
Obviousness is a legal conclusion that must be supported by evidence - currently, you have no evidence that it's the right conclusion, just a gut feeling that's based on hindsight. To show something is obvious, you need to show that one or more pieces of prior art that existed at the time of filing, alone or in combination, teach or suggest each and every element in the claims. So, for example, the claim quoted above includes "receiving at a first server system" - that's easy... here's a patent from 1995 that shows a server system receiving information. It then says "information related to users of a social network site hosted on a second server system". That's easy, too - we can go back to the original Myspace or Facebook pages. So now, in combination, we've got the entire first line.
Then keep going.

If you can do that for everything in the claim, you can prove it's obvious, rather than just alleging it.

Re:Statistics

[camperdave]

The USPTO jumped the shark long ago. A decade ago they issued a patent for swinging sideways. In 1993 they issued a patent for using a laser pointer to exercise your cat.

Re:Statistics

[TheSpoom]

No offense, but I would hazard a guess that the smartest and most experienced engineers would avoid the USPTO like the plague.

Well...

[anom]

"So, would you feel comfortable being judged by the online company you keep?"

That is pretty much how people are judged in real life too (minus the word online).

Re:Well...

[macbass]

Except that my online company includes friends at locations thousands of miles away, kind of hard to keep up with them like the friends closer by. Additionally, while I haven't RTFA this appears to allow no room for error and assumes my friends are (mostly) mindless clones who automatically repeat or repost what I do. I don't know about you all, but I find this one step closer to welcoming our evil overlords. Whatever happened to innocent until proven guilty? Have I not lost my wide-eyed innocence yet?

Re:Well...

[magic maverick]

I get around the problem by not having any friends. Either online or in real life.

I really don't want to be judged by the company I keep on Slashdot. People's tastes around here are just bizarre. Natalie Portman? Covered in grits? Petrified? Let alone the obsession with wanting to Beowulf everything.

Re:Well...

[Shotgun]

Except that my online company includes friends at locations thousands of miles away

And yet, they are still friends. The association begs the question, "Why are they friends?" If you like and share their comments about the joys of smoking pot, even though you live in NC, it is an indication that you lean toward approving of the use of pot. No big deal, in and of itself, but if combined with an extremely large utility bill, and a propensity for buying large amounts of gardening chemicals, even though you live in a town home, and being caught with a large roll of cash, there may be a suspicion that you might be growing and selling pot. At least, that will be the argument used by the police to get a warrant to break down you door and pointlessly ruin your life.

Birds of a feather, flock together, and you WILL be known by the company you keep. These cliches don't go away just because you keep the company digitally.

Re:Well...

[stanlyb]

Because, my friend, i may wanna to kill you, in my thoughts, but that does now make me guilty. It would, only if i explicitly express my desire, and/or actually do it. But what you say is actually that once that thought crosses my mind, i am guilty by association. Welcome Minority Report, it appears it was not science fiction.

Re:Well...

[camperdave]

I get around the problem by not having any friends. Either online or in real life.

It's true: magic maverick (2615475) is all alone in the world.

But he does have a fan

Re:Well...

[Opportunist]

Oh c'mon, this is the Internet. Where the men are men, women are men and kids are FBI agents.

Pigeonholing without purpose.

[Remus Shepherd]

Bwa-ha-hah. The porn I like is nothing like the porn my friends like, and vice versa. Not even my girlfriend and I agree on porn. I'm also willing to bet that the illegal activities I've done in my life are nothing like the ones my friends have committed.

Where did Google get this correlation theory? It seems completely counter to my experience of human beings as individuals.

Re:Pigeonholing without purpose.

[Vanderhoth]

I think this is a great excuse to unfriend my mom. She's always posting copyrighted material from the dog shelter she works at and I wouldn't want to be guilty of associating with someone posting material advocating helping homeless animals without the permission of the humane society.

Re:Pigeonholing without purpose.

[swillden]

How many of your friends avoid porn entirely due to their religious beliefs? Many of mine do, but I suspect you have different sorts of friends than I do.

I don't think the concept is invalid, just that you're applying it at too detailed a level, and confusing "more likely to" with "will". Perhaps someone you're friends with is 2% more likely than average to have an interest in something you like. To a human looking at the data without applying any mathematical analysis, such a weak indicator would be completely invisible. And, actually, such a weak indicator is probably useless for any kind of predictions... but it may become very useful when combined with several other weak indicators.

Speaking of Which

[eldavojohn]

Dear Slashdot,

I'd like to ask you some questions about your ongoing involvement and interview with Hans Reiser ... I haven't seen any activity in CmdrTaco's wife's gmail account for quite some time!

Sincerely,

Googlock Holmes

Do not too much evil?

[Fishead]

And that is why instead of Google Drive, I'm looking for an alternative that encrypts my family photo's rather than analyzes them.

I don't THINK I have anything illegal in my photo drive, but you never know what may be spotted by a robot looking through my thousands of photos.

Re:Do not too much evil?

[Nadaka]

Your baby pictures.

Chris Hansen would like you to have a seat over there.

Oddly good news.

[Anonymous Coward]

If Google didn't patent this someone else would and then any relationship-linking done by Google would be at the risk of patent infringment. That is a problem with the patent system, not Google in particular.

This is one of those cases where decent behavior intersects poorly with mathematics. Most of the people I consider friends do share the same view of copyright that I do (i.e. Lawrence Lessig's view) and some of that is simply due to my recommending his book and advocating its principles. That said, Mom is a friend and has never changed any of her views based on my input (e.g. she still runs Windows Vista). So in my single person anecdote I can still see the strong exception and the obvious correlation. Spread over millions of people I'm guessing the correlation between shared views on honesty/dishonesty issues is pretty strong.

The question isn't about the patent, its about what they will do about it. The people who purchased YouTube, and spent $millions digitizing books are not going to become *AA puppets any more than absolutely required by law.

So if this idea must be patented (as our current system dictates it must) I'd rather Google had it than Apple or Microsoft.

There's prior art

[RNLockwood]

This shouldn't fly. Christians, and perhaps Jews, have believed in original sin in which guilt has been transferred from Eve for millennia. They published but didn't file for a patent.

Re:Kevin Bacon

[second_coming]

If Kevin Bacon does anything dodgy, we're all fucked

You hvae 0 friends

[Krneki]

So, the more friends you have the bigger criminal you are?

nothing to see here

[Sun.Jedi]

We have retarded patent, copyright, and trademark laws in the US. This is not news.

DING fries are done

Yes, Very Comfortable

[Bob9113]

"By extension, the same holds true for porn, pirated videos and music, etc., right? So, would you feel comfortable being judged by the online company you keep?"

Definitely. Most of the people whose company I enjoy favor a liberal interpretation of the authority of copyright and prefer adult-oriented content to PG and lighter fare. They speak ill of their government when it is justified (and sometimes when it is not) and accept that the four boxes of liberty are all unfortunate necessities. And they believe that even suspected terrorists who worship the wrong deity are endowed by their creator with the rights documented in the Declaration, Constitution, and Bill of Rights.

I rather like that sort of person, and hope that the world sees me as one of them. I think people who are not proud to fit that description tend to lie somewhere between pretentious and dull, and are detrimental to our advancement as a productive, open, honest, and self-aware society.

Re:Yes, Very Comfortable

[geek]

"By extension, the same holds true for porn, pirated videos and music, etc., right? So, would you feel comfortable being judged by the online company you keep?"

Definitely. Most of the people whose company I enjoy favor a liberal interpretation of the authority of copyright and prefer adult-oriented content to PG and lighter fare. They speak ill of their government when it is justified (and sometimes when it is not) and accept that the four boxes of liberty are all unfortunate necessities. And they believe that even suspected terrorists who worship the wrong deity are endowed by their creator with the rights documented in the Declaration, Constitution, and Bill of Rights.

I rather like that sort of person, and hope that the world sees me as one of them. I think people who are not proud to fit that description tend to lie somewhere between pretentious and dull, and are detrimental to our advancement as a productive, open, honest, and self-aware society.

Definitely. Most of the people whose company I enjoy favor a conservative interpretation of the authority of copyright and prefer family-oriented content to XXX and lighter fare. They speak positively of their government when it is justified (and sometimes when it is not) and accept that the four branches of liberty are all fortunate inheritances from our forward thinking founders. And they believe that self proclaimed terrorists who twist and contort their religion into a religion of hate instead of peace and wage a holy war on the West deserve to be rebuffed in the most forceful manner necessary.

I rather like that sort of person, and hope that the world sees me as one of them. I think people who are not proud to fit that description tend to lie somewhere between naive and immature, and are detrimental to our advancement as a productive, open, honest, and self-aware society. However many of my close friends also fit this description and it doesn't affect my relationships with them because life is about more than politics, regardless of what the sitting President of the United States says.

Re:Lets hope the police take no notice of this bul

[kelemvor4]

http://politics.slashdot.org/story/12/09/07/239239/poll-based-system-predicts-us-election-results-for-president-senate

Given the proper algorithms, statistical analysis can produce very accurate results. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that it's not as simple as one friend you haven't seen in years posting something once correlates to you doing that same thing as well.

It's not who you know, it's who you hate.

[sabt-pestnu]

Nothing illegal in your photo drive?

Do you have a flag of Taiwan in a picture? Perhaps you took a picture of your car? (Especially if you post it on your company's vanity page...) Or maybe there was a stranger in the background?

It's not so much what is illegal in your photos, as it is "who takes offense at your pictures". And when anyone can sue (civil court) anyone for anything, there doesn't even have to be a law against it.

stupid bullshit

[Nyder]

Growing up I didn't smoke cigarettes (still don't, never got into that), but a lot of my friends did, buy this study, I would of been labeled a cigarette smoker.

Later on, a lot of the people I knew had felonies, I never had, but I guess I would be guilty of that also.

I have gay friends, so I guess I'm gay also (I'm not, but according to this I would be...)

My friends are a lot of things I am not, but now, maybe I am...

Not statistics

[Epeeist]

So,they've managed to patent using statistics? Is anyone actually doing their job in the patent office?

Nah, they have managed to patent a logical fallacy.

Re:You've got it REVERSE!

[Theaetetus]

Excuse me, when you file a patent you have to prove THAT YOU HAVE A CASE (for getting a new patent awarded). You describe it the other way around, we (the PTO, whoever) have to prove that it's not a valid patent, with a default of "award it"???

Nuts! (Sorry, but that's how I describe this reversal or who has to prove what).

Excuse me, but I am a patent attorney, and you're wrong. Maybe you're describing the way you'd like the law to be. It's currently the way I said.

Re:You've got it REVERSE!

[Theaetetus]

You are not saying much. If a file a patent, do *I* have to file proof, or does *THE PTO* have to prove me wrong, and if they can't/don't they have to award the patent?

THAT is what you said - it is not quite clear, since it is a reply to a reply - so I would just like you to confirm.

The latter - the PTO has to prove you wrong, and if they can't, they have to issue the patent. It's because of 35 USC 102, which says that an applicant "shall be entitled to a patent" subject to the requirements of the Patent Act. It's similar to the "shall issue" firearms licensing statutes that require the police to issue a permit unless they can prove that you're unfit.

Re:This is why.

[Lithdren]

If my 'friends' view it as such a pain to contact me personally about things they'd like me to personally attend, im not so sure they're really all that great of friends to begin with.

Re:You've got it REVERSE!

[Theaetetus]

In that case I still keep my "Nuts!" comment, but no longer point it at your comment, but at the patent law. And you have my sympathies - I think I like MY job even more now...

I don't believe in that patent stuff at all anyway - I'm German, after all, and the way we got to where we are was through COPYING (British machines). I would be a hypocrite to defend patents now, just because now WE have the machines and somebody else copies them. The whole world is nuts.

As a funny aside, Switzerland used to have no patents, and yet was in compliance with international treaties like the Paris Convention because they treated foreign inventors exactly the same as they did their local inventors: no patent protection for anyone. Their reasoning was that Switzerland had so few local inventors to protect, and they wanted to steal technology from other countries. It was in fact your country that first got pissed off at them and threatened all sorts of economic pressure if they didn't implement a patent law, because they were upset at the Swiss stealing German inventions.

So, I guess everyone's a hypocrite. :)

Re:You've got it REVERSE!

[Theaetetus]

The latter - the PTO has to prove you wrong, and if they can't, they have to issue the patent.

I've just invented a knerbweg for throoling a morginated comdowuler via a plirkitwang.

Can you disprove that?

Sure... It's unpatentable under 35 USC 112 because your terms are undefined, and you'd receive a rejection on those grounds. You can rebut it by providing explicit definitions.

I mean, really... You think the USPTO never thought of that?

Doe-eyed idealist here...

[schmookeeg]

But wouldn't this patent allow Google to sue for infringement any agency like the MPAA/RIAA who used techniques like this to find people to sue?