Rant Google

[computerex]

Heilor is perfectly correct, it's not Google's fault that it acted like any other search engine. There are ways to protect your information from web crawlers, one of them being: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robots_exclusion_standard .

As far as Gmail is concerned, I think it is the best emailing service I have ever signed up for. I get no spam, excellent storage, it's just great.

 

[Ghostrider]

It is in the works, but no means final.

Give it time: the web allows too much people to talk too much. No government likes this, and let's not talk about some private entities.

 

[Moonwalker]

Google does have the largest database. "Google has it but others don't" doesn't mean that Google is intentionally keeping data that others aren't.

Google does not only have the largest database. Google, which got nominated for a "Big Brother Award" by the civil liberties group Public Information Research, also has the largest interest not to take care on data protection. They are not willing to disclose internals. But they are willing and proud to announce that they are going to collect as much personal data as possible to be able to, among other things, answer "which job is the right one for me?" or "I'm bored, with what should I fiddle right now?". Google is going to exploit the data of its users. It starts by saving the IP, the type of browser, the browser language, time and date and so on. They compile and record motion and personality profiles. They are going to index all the world's information they can get. Of course this is not a bad idea to make the informations searchable for a moment. But a lot of people are naive enough to not being aware that Google is going to do way more with all that stored data than just to make it searchable...

But I'm anyway not a part of it anymore. I'll use a search in future that does not record the IP and other stuff.

As far as Gmail is concerned, I think it is the best emailing service I have ever signed up for. I get no spam, excellent storage, it's just great.

Yeah, and it scans every mail :speakcool:

 

[computerex]

Yeah, and it scans every mail :speakcool:

Oh yes, as if you (or any of us) make any emails that are classified or interesting to the rest of the world. Honestly, let's not turn Google into another conspiracy.

 

[Ghostrider]

Oh yes, as if you (or any of us) make any emails that are classified or interesting to the rest of the world. Honestly, let's not turn Google into another conspiracy.

You could be surprised at how much companies would pay to know your browsing habits and personal preferences. It's not a conspiracy but a business, and you're the merchandise being sold.

 

[computerex]

You could be surprised at how much companies would pay to know your browsing habits and personal preferences. It's not a conspiracy but a business, and you're the merchandise being sold.

Yes, and their motive is to make products or sell them in such a way so that we buy them, no? What's wrong with that? But that's another thread xD

 

[Ghostrider]

Yes, and their motive is to make products or sell them in such a way so that we buy them, no? What's wrong with that?

You misunderstand: they do not profile you just to sell you stuff, they profile you to sell that profile. That's where the real money is, not in sending you targeted advertisements. No offence meant, but your money is peanuts to them.

But your insurance would really like to know something about your lifestyle you wouldn't want them to...

 

[Moonwalker]

Oh yes, as if you (or any of us) make any emails that are classified or interesting to the rest of the world. Honestly, let's not turn Google into another conspiracy.

There is no conspiracy. Gmail scans your emails and does not exclude usage of the content for marketing purposes. Just like Ghostrider said, you're the merchandise being sold.

Google always tries to find the lowest common denominator regarding privacy. In case of Gmail, even if you don't use it, you are still being affected as soon as you send an email to somebody who uses Gmail, although you even did never agree to the creepy conditions.

I'm not using anything anymore that slips out of the house of Google.

 

[Eagle]

Google's motto is do no evil, and they haven't done anything too terrible but they know a lot about you.

Your IP doesn't change as often as you think. It stays the same for as long as you are connected by modem, and can stay the same for several weeks if you don't restart your router for your DSL or Cable.

Every time you Google search, Google has your IP and what you searched and which links you followed. Every time you visit a page with Google Ads on it Google knows your IP and what website you're looking at, when, and how often. If you log into one of Google's services they can link your IP address to those actions and add that information to your profile.

Not to mention if you use Google maps for directions they have additional information about where you may be planning on traveling.

A few other slightly evil things Google has done includes filtering searches and providing identifiable information to the Chinese government, but they're not the only company to do this (yahoo and microsoft too) and if they didn't they would not have access to the Chinese market.

And of course Google keeps introducing new services and are becoming deeply involved in most things you do online. Mapquest -> Googlemaps, Sourceforge -> Google Code, Skype -> Google Voice, Manage your medical records with Google Health, Google Android, GOOG-411, Google Scholar, Google Books, the Google OS. This isn't inherently evil, but it gets a little worrisome.

So the moral of the story, be aware how much personal information is out there, and act accordingly to maintain the level of privacy you want.

 

[willy88]

Wake up, Moonwalker. The Google has you.

 

[ar81]

Google is going to exploit the data of its users. It starts by saving the IP, the type of browser, the browser language, time and date and so on. They compile and record motion and personality profiles. They are going to index all the world's information they can get. Of course this is not a bad idea to make the informations searchable for a moment. But a lot of people are naive enough to not being aware that Google is going to do way more with all that stored data than just to make it searchable...

Just like a big guy in New York saying "I am a pretty girl from California"...
Or profiling computers from Internet Cafes where many users come.
Or considering "preferences" of a user based on school homework. Unless students like what they see at school, profiling that may end up with a huge bias, and advertisers may waste effort and money.

Or profiling hijacked accounts, like in cases I have seen in the past, where a jealous exboyfriend sends indecent emails from his exgirl's email (a friend passed through this, as her exboyfriend started to harass her). I recall another case of an Internet cafe who owner an internet cafe, who installed spyware in his computers, got to steal passwords of a female artist I know and as he was rejected by her, he started to send indecent emails to his contacts. His contacts were in the press, and she had to contact them personally to clarify her account was hijacked.

Profiling is going to be absolutely unreliable, because it does not consider non predictable human nature.

 

[Eagle]

Profiling is going to be absolutely unreliable, because it does not consider non predictable human nature.

Most people tend to develop routines which can last a while. If you take the time to think you'll notice you go to the same few news sites, the same webcomics, OF and some other hobby or interest related sites. Sure you'll go to a few new pages you found off Digg or something, but there's a core routine you use on the internet.

Most accounts don't get jacked. So that's a small percentage of the userbase. Besides, a large number of people can be marketed to quite cheaply, so only a very small percentage needs to respond in order to make a profit.

 

[RisingFury]

This has absolutely nothing to do with Google. Sure, Google stores data, but it doesn't specifically target private data. Google also does not break into password protected web pages. It's crawlers can only reach publicly available websites, which means that if abuse of private data he occurred, it's the responsibility of the poorly protected website or you, depending on details.


Besides, IIRC, Google will delete the entry once it tries to update the site and discovers the site doesn't exist.

 

[Ghostrider]

Profiling is going to be absolutely unreliable, because it does not consider non predictable human nature.

Profiling will never be 100% accurate but it only needs to be 70% or less accurate to have an idea of the patterns you follow in your life. It's enough to know what your preferences are in matter of food, leisure time, your immediate acquaintances and your level of income. It's enough to determine your economic status, your financial reliability, your overall health. All information that can - and will - be used against you. I may not predict what you're going to do in the next 12 hours, but unless you're Destro it's not that important as long as I can tell what are your chances of paying back a loan.

 

[ar81]

Profiling will never be 100% accurate but it only needs to be 70% or less accurate to have an idea of the patterns you follow in your life. It's enough to know what your preferences are in matter of food, leisure time, your immediate acquaintances and your level of income. It's enough to determine your economic status, your financial reliability, your overall health. All information that can - and will - be used against you. I may not predict what you're going to do in the next 12 hours, but unless you're Destro it's not that important as long as I can tell what are your chances of paying back a loan.

Reliablility... It comes from statistics. In statistics, non statistical bias leads to unreliable data. If you want a wild guess, that's fine, but I doubt you may ever measure non statistical bias, and therefore I doubt you might know if it is 70% reliable or 10% reliable.

If they spy income, banking status, health, they would belong to the realm of corporate spyware, which would involve a huge risk of scandal.

Banks are more likely to be sellers of data. It happens with several banks. Bank practices do not use to get into the public eye, like private data selling to make extra money, or like how bigger richer customers get special interest rate discounts so normal people pay more interests than bigger ones.

Also, there are other practices involving products available for rich customers that are not available for normal people or companies.

 

[Moonwalker]

Sure, Google stores data, but it doesn't specifically target private data.

Wrong. Googles basic intention, beside storing just everything they can get, is to take a significant part of as much peoples life as possible. And they already succeed in that. They follow your web behaviour and collect as much data from you as far as possible legally and as far as everyone lets them do that (while legality in case of Google always has been reduced to the lowest common denominator). If you follow Eric Schmidt, Chief Executive Officer of Google, you'll experience that it is Googles intention to collect, store and compile as much data of its users as possible, so that in future it will be possible to ask private questions like which job could be the right one for you or what could you do in your free time regarding your interests. Googles users are the merchandise being sold. That's the basis. Nothing else.

Your IP doesn't change as often as you think. It stays the same for as long as you are connected by modem, and can stay the same for several weeks if you don't restart your router for your DSL or Cable.

In my case it changes about two times within every 24 hours since I am connected to the web (which means since 2001)

Google's motto is do no evil, and they haven't done anything too terrible but they know a lot about you.

Oh yeah, Google, that's a nice coloured word. And Google of course is about cool mottos... if you just do not want to know anything about it really.

 

[ar81]

What about Microsoft? Google works in the application level. Microsoft works in the OS level, so anything you do can be monitored, and the fact that you pay (instead of free Google stuff) does not guarantee your privacy either.

With Google, what you do when using Google services can be monitored, but with Microsoft EVERYTHING you do with your computer can be monitored. To me it looks like a conspiracy theory for people with too much spare time.

I just wonder... WHO is the competitor of Google? Who might be interested in discrediting Google now that Google wants to create an operating system?

 

[Ghostrider]

Reliablility... It comes from statistics. In statistics, non statistical bias leads to unreliable data.

Profiling may be limited but it works within its scope. Trust me, it works. It's not necessary to "spy" on you to determine your wealth and your health, analyzing your habits and your purchases doesn't necessitate the use of any spyware: it doesn't take MI6 to see where you live, what kind of house you live in, what car you drive.

You worry about banks? Worry more about debt collection agencies: compared to them, banks are in the gentlemen's league. Those guys are extortionists, to use a nice word. They don't care if you don't owe anything to anybody, if someone sells some imaginary "debt" to them, or if they buy it, they'll collect, and their means are highly illegal.

 

[cjp]

What about Microsoft? Google works in the application level. Microsoft works in the OS level, so anything you do can be monitored, and the fact that you pay (instead of free Google stuff) does not guarantee your privacy either.

With Google, what you do when using Google services can be monitored, but with Microsoft EVERYTHING you do with your computer can be monitored. To me it looks like a conspiracy theory for people with too much spare time.

I just wonder... WHO is the competitor of Google? Who might be interested in discrediting Google now that Google wants to create an operating system?

True. And at least most of Google's software is open source, so the paranoid geeks can check what it's doing. This can't be said about windows.

 

[Moonwalker]

What about Microsoft? Google works in the application level. Microsoft works in the OS level, so anything you do can be monitored, and the fact that you pay (instead of free Google stuff) does not guarantee your privacy either.

Right. That's why I use proper tools and methods to restrict Windows as far as possible. That's also why Windows only is my gaming system. For private stuff and work, I use Linux. But I don't store private stuff and data on a web-enabled computer anyway.

With Google, what you do when using Google services can be monitored, but with Microsoft EVERYTHING you do with your computer can be monitored. To me it looks like a conspiracy theory for people with too much spare time.

This is what turns out to be reality as soon as you want to know more than to only use it trustful and don't think about it, just like more than 90% of users do I think, which I was a part of until yesterday to be honest.

I just wonder... WHO is the competitor of Google? Who might be interested in discrediting Google now that Google wants to create an operating system?

Universities, experts and commissioners for data protection for example are not interested in discrediting Google but interested in watching it, because of its dubious methods. Microsoft also is dubious here and there, but not that much as Google, which is called the worst one by Privacy International, just as one example. Google has to be watched and people should be informed. I don't like their ideas and visions. It's creepy. This does not have anything to do with being paranoid, but with common sense and taking care of privacy.

Google is easy to use. Many people use it already as their standard homepage at work and at home (as I did as well for years). It is being integrated into the majority of browers I think. Google has easy access to almost everybodies behaviour like no other. Not even Microsoft has dreamed about what Google is able to do, already does and is going to extend in future, potenionally including to enter the OS market.

But there is a simple choice: hands off. Be aware. There are even better alternatives.