Do not use Google Desktop, warns the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF). At the user’s option the new Google Desktop software will “search across computers” and a new feature will store copies of the user’s Word documents and other personal files on Google’s servers. And, these files can be searched from any other computer of the user.
“EFF urges consumers not to use this feature, because it will make their personal data more vulnerable to subpoenas from the government and possibly private litigants, while providing a convenient one-stop-shop for hackers who've obtained a user's Google password,” urges a statement by the EFF today (Google Copies Your Hard Drive - Government Smiles in Anticipation).
"Coming on the heels of serious consumer concern about government snooping into Google's search logs, it's shocking that Google expects its users to now trust it with the contents of their personal computers," said EFF Staff Attorney Kevin Bankston. "If you use the Search Across Computers feature and don't configure Google Desktop very carefully—and most people won't—Google will have copies of your tax returns, love letters, business records, financial and medical files, and whatever other text-based documents the Desktop software can index. The government could then demand these personal files with only a subpoena rather than the search warrant it would need to seize the same things from your home or business, and in many cases you wouldn't even be notified in time to challenge it. Other litigants—your spouse, your business partners or rivals, whoever—could also try to cut out the middleman (you) and subpoena Google for your files."
Let’s put this into perspective: anyone can download a free copy of Google Desktop and if they don’t know what they’re doing, Google will start indexing their personal files which among other things can be open to subpoena.
If you think this is science fiction then you haven’t been reading the news. Last week the U.S. Department of Justice's demanded an amazing amount of search data from Google. Originally the DOJ requested all web addresses (URLs) contained in the Google database as well as a record of "all queries that have been entered into your company' s search engine between June 1, 2005 and July 31, 2005." In other words, it wanted a list of every website in the Google database plus every search request ever made during a two-month period. Faced with resistance, DOJ settled on a random sample of one million web addresses as well as a list of every search string during a one-week period.
It is now confirmed by Google: Google admits it keeps and collates EVERY search query. While we’re not exactly sure how Google uses all of these, we do now know the company can be forced to divulge the information under court order.
A key problem highlighted by EFF is that the Electronic Communication Privacy Act (1986) gives only “limited privacy protection to emails and other files that are stored with online service providers—much less privacy than the legal protections for the same information when it's on your computer at home.” EFF is quick to point out that that very limited level of protection “could disappear if Google uses your data for marketing purposes.”
Furthermore, according to the EFF “Google says it is not yet scanning the files it copies from your hard drive in order to serve targeted advertising, but it hasn't ruled out the possibility, and Google's current privacy policy appears to allow it.”
Google is the most fearsome and now as well the most powerful company in the world. While only making profit approaching $2 - 3 billion per year it I am sure won’t be long before it catches GE as the most profitable as well.
Ironically, I love Google as a utility. I use it 20-30 times per day on average. But Google has now become a pop culture icon that is influencing our social fabric and is now a part of the daily routine of tens of millions of people. "Just Google it..." is as common in our lexicon as "Where's the bathroom?"
And Google doesn't want to be just a search engine they want to be the center of the human genome universe, the world's biggest media broker, the king of mapping and geography, and the list goes, on and on.
I love using Google and I wish I owned stock -- but at the same time they scare the living dickens out of me.
More on Google watching you:
When Google is not your friend
Bill would force Web sites to delete personal info
© 2006 Toby Ward - Prescient Digital Media
