Google Hasn't Stopped Reading Your Emails (theoutline.com)

An anonymous reader shares a report: If you're a Gmail user, your messages and emails likely aren't as private as you'd think. Google reads each and every one, scanning your painfully long email chains and vacation responders in order to collect more data on you. Google uses the data gleaned from your messages in order to inform a whole host of other products and services, NBC News reported Thursday.

Though Google announced that it would stop using consumer Gmail content for ad personalization last July, the language permitting it to do so is still included in its current privacy policy, and it without a doubt still scans users emails for other purposes. Aaron Stein, a Google spokesperson, told NBC that Google also automatically extracts keyword data from users' Gmail accounts, which is then fed into machine learning programs and other products within the Google family. Stein told NBC that Google also "may analyze [email] content to customize search results, better detect spam and malware," a practice the company first announced back in 2012.

Comments

One thing for sure.

[techno-vampire]

Google's completely forgotten about "Do no evil."

Re:One thing for sure.

[drinkypoo]

Google's completely forgotten about "Do no evil."

You've completely forgotten it was don't be evil.

Not so fast...

[The Cynical Critic]

a practice the company first announced back in 2012.

That's an awfully charitable way to describe it... My recollection is that they denied reading people's email for years and in 2012 someone was finally able to prove this so conclusively that Google had to fess up, but naturally felt the need to to point out that this invasion of peoples' privacy was done by "algorithms" and not by people in it's admission of guilt.

Re:How is this news?

[SandorZoo]

My memory of signing up for Gmail was that Google was quite open about using the data anonymously for various purposes, a position more honest than many others who do the same without the courtesy of saying so.

When I signed up for Gmail they said they would be scanning my email so they could my adverts more relevant. The welcome email Google sent my in 2004 included this paragraph:

You may also have noticed some text ads or related links to the right of this message. They're placed there in the same way that ads are placed alongside Google search results and, through our AdSense program, on content pages across the web. The matching of ads to content in your Gmail messages is performed entirely by computers; never by people. Because the ads and links are matched to information that is of interest to you, we hope you'll find them relevant and useful.

So they certainly said they would be reading email for targeted advertizing purposes back in 2004.

Re:Calendaring

[ShanghaiBill]

Around 2000, Larry Ellison declared "Privacy is dead, get over it."

That wasn't Larry Ellison. It was Scott McNealy.

Use GnuPG

[thePsychologist]

Okay, this isn't very practical in many cases. However, I have recently converted one person on Gmail to use GnuPG with Thunderbird, and it works!

It helps if the person is already using thunderbird, and YOU set it up for them. With the Enigmail extension, the encryption will be done automatically by recipient.

The hardest part is the passphrase - lots of people don't want to remember long passphrases. However, you can get their computer to remember it forever. Not the safest, but it WILL prevent Gmail from reading the mails sent to and from the person you convert.