Privacy groups want the law changed to stop Google using, or divulging to outside agencies, the vast amount of personal data it has access to. By Conal Walsh
Sunday October 2, 2005
The Observer
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/business/story/0,6903,1582719,00.html
Google took a further step away from its folksy image when it hired its first professional lobbyist in Washington earlier this year. But it turned out to be a timely move. The world’s biggest search engine has been under attack on many fronts in 2005 – and its activities have spawned a cottage industry of Google critics, who complain above all that the company’s dramatic rise to prominence is a threat to our privacy.
Much protest focuses on the company’s use of ‘cookies’ – pieces of programming code – which Google plants on your computer’s hard drive when you use its service.
The cookies enable Google to keep a record of your web-searching history. They don’t expire until 2038, meaning that potentially sensitive information on your interests and peccadilloes could be stored for upwards of 30 years. It is sobering to think what fraudsters, identity thieves, blackmailers or government snoopers could do with this information if they got access to it.
Privacy groups are up in arms. ‘We need to re-evaluate the role of big search engines, email portals, and all the rest of it,’ says Daniel Brandt, of the website Google Watch.
‘They all track everything. Google was the first to do it, arrogantly and without any apologies; now everyone assumes that if Google does it, they can do it too.’
Lauren Weinstein, founder of the US-based People for Internet Responsibility, says out-of-date privacy laws fail to capture the information-gathering powers of youthful but powerful new media companies.
‘The relevant laws are generally so weak – if they exist at all – that it’s difficult to file complaints when you can’t find out what data they’re keeping and how they are using it,’ says Weinstein.
Google says these fears are unfounded, that it respects privacy and keeps strictly within relevant privacy laws. Personal data are logged on computer files but ‘no humans’ access it, says the company; safeguards are in place to prevent employees from examining traffic data without special permission from senior managers. Nor is personal information shared with outsiders. All Google’s records are impenetrable to hackers.
Besides, say Google devotees, open access and the empowerment of the individual are central to the whole philosophy of the company; it would never seek to misuse or betray its users’ secrets.
Life, though, can be complicated. In repressive countries such as China, Google and other portals have little choice but to accommodate the authorities, which regularly censor the internet and spy on users.
In the US, Google has declined to say how often it responds to requests for information from America’s intelligence and law enforcement agencies. And there are concerns that what Google is building with its data-retention operation is a vast marketing database, which one day could be exploited ruthlessly.
Simmering discontent turned into open confrontation earlier this year when Google launched Gmail, a free email service designed to compete with Yahoo and Microsoft’s Hotmail.
To ordinary punters, the great advantage of Gmail was the enormous two gigabytes of storage space it offered, enabling users to keep all their old messages. But Google planned to make the service pay by scanning customers’ emails for keywords in order to send them targeted advertisements – a flagrant breach of privacy, according to opponents.
The Consumer Federation of America demanded that Google rethink the scheme, while California politician Liz Figueroa called for changes in the law to protect users’ ‘most intimate and private email thoughts’. The London-based campaigners Privacy International filed complaints with data protection agencies in several countries, including Britain.
The UK Information Commissioner took no action after consulting with Google, but campaigners argue that government bodies operating with a small staff and obsolete laws are no match for a technology superpower like Google, which is expanding at an almost exponential rate and continues to innovate in its use of personal data.
In claims denied by Google, Privacy International’s Simon Davies asserts that there is ‘an absence of contractual commitment to the security of data’ and ‘fundamental problems in achieving lawful customer consent’.
For now, campaigners may have to console themselves with a story of the biter bit. Google’s chief executive, Eric Schmidt, was reportedly enraged this month when an online newspaper published his address and other personal details – having found them on Google.
