Is Google protecting privacy?
Posted in Technicalon Jan 21, 2006
“In court papers filed on Wednesday in U.S. District Court in San Jose, the Justice Department stated that Google had refused to comply with a subpoena issued last year for one million random Web addresses from Google’s databases as well as records of all searches entered on Google during any one-week period.” (source)
The Justice Department said that it needed the information to renew the 1998 Child Online Protection Act which made it illegal to make pornography available to minors.
Many are praising Google for standing up for privacy rights and not complying with the subpoena. I’m not so quick to give such priase.
I think there may be two reasons that are less discussed why google is non-compliant with handing over the information.
The first of which deals with privacy. Google may not want to turn records over because it doesn’t want to reveal how much information it actually collects. Google may indeed collect large amounts of information, and is afraid of coming under attacks by privacy groups again by revealing exactly how much information it actually collects.
The second possible reason deals with pornography. How much of Google’s business deals with porn? How much does Google support the porn industry by helping users find their porn? If Google feels that their popularity is dependent partially at least on people trying to find sick materials, then they may not be motivated to help a law that would make it more difficult for people to find those materials.
Is Google evil and not turning over information because they have something to hide? Is Google evil and trying to hedge anti-filth laws so that they can be the access providers to filth? Or is Google not evil and really trying to protect their user’s privacy?
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- Tags: Digital Privacy, Google
