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Google Halts Gmail Scanning for Education Apps Users
itwbennett (1594911) writes "Google will no longer scan the email messages of students and other school staff who use its Google Apps for Education suite, exempting about 30 million users from the chronically controversial practice for Gmail advertising. In addition, Google is removing the option for Apps for Education administrators to allow ads to be shown to their users. Until now, ads were turned off by default, but admins could turn on this feature at their discretion. A Google spokesperson called the move part of a 'continued evolution of our efforts to provide the best experience for our users, including students' and not a response to a recent lawsuit alleging that by scanning Gmail messages Google violated wiretapping laws and breached users' privacy."
- http://techcrunch.com/2014/04/...
New Google Mission Statement: "Don't continue to be evil after we've been called out on it in the tech press."
. The Google blog post does not mention other types of scanning (neither to confirm or deny their existence, nor to announce that they will cease).
My first program:
Hell Segmentation fault
>It feels like an invasion of privacy.
Then use someone else.^1 It's not difficult.
If you don't know that there are other email providers or that you can set up your own mail server, then the problem lies with /you/, not Google.
But that's only the beginning. If you don't want people looking at your stuff, encrypt it. Email is a postcard without any ability to put an "envelope" around it except full-on encryption. Otherwise /anyone/ in the RECEIVED: chain and Tinfoil Agencies can read it.^2
Sorry, but your argument is invalid.
--
BMO
Footnotes:
1. My oldest active email address is literally in someone's basement on their LAN. For 18 years, roughly.
2. Before the idiots chime in here and say "but nobody should be looking at all!!#$!$#!@#" - not every country has the same privacy laws, and not every provider in the RECEIVED: chain has the same policies. Depending on Google to defend your privacy with plaintext messages is dumb.
It's not wiretapping because you give consent to the scanning when you sign up for their FREE email account.
If you want privacy, get an email service that features it. Don't expect privacy when you willfully opt-in.
2. Before the idiots chime in here and say "but nobody should be looking at all!!#$!$#!@#" - not every country has the same privacy laws, and not every provider in the RECEIVED: chain has the same policies. Depending on Google to defend your privacy with plaintext messages is dumb.
It's neither idiotic, nor dumb. The way email works might be part of your specialist knowledge (and mine and most people who read slashdot). But that doesn't mean that perfectly intelligent people in other domains know how email is implemented. If you took a survey of doctors or architects or humanities professors, then probably a minority would know about the plaintext transport of email, They are not stupid people, they just know about different things. And many things that they know about you don't. But they are not calling you an idiot.
When we criticise the bad behaviour of tech companies, we do it for EVERYONE, not just for computer geeks. People without this specific field of interest don't deserve to have their lack of specialist knowledge taken advantage of any more than they deserve to be called idiots by the likes of you.
Then use someone else.^1 It's not difficult.
Many schools now use Google apps for students. That includes Gmail, Drive, and productivity apps. My son is required to hand his assignments in via Google Drive and use Gmail to communicate with teachers and fellow students... So "use someone else" is a nice generalization but not always an option... That's why I'm happy to see this.
fwiw, personally, I have always run my own mailserver/webserver/dns.
I've been involved in negotiations with a couple of contracts relating to Google Apps for Enterprise/Education.
In each one, the "scanning" has been explicitly mentioned in the contract. In each one, scanning for the purposes of advertising has only happened if the domain administrator allows it to happen. If it is turned off, Google will not scan mail for the purposes of advertising content.
There are of course other reasons why google will scan your email. Spam/Antivirus filtering and indexing to enable search functionality are two that come to mind.
Basically, all Google have done is remove the domain administrators ability to allow ads, and I'm not aware of anyone I know who used Google Apps for Education/Enterprise with it turned on anyway.
The dog ate it.