"google Copies Your Hard Drive - Government Smiles In Anticipation" Breaking News

Well, that certainly got your attention didn't it.

 

Apparently, according to the EFF (Electronic Frontier Foundation), Google Desktop is a nasty program. To put it simply. Their extremely biased view against Google's creation obviously shows that they are teaming with Microsoft, but that would be slander, so I didn't say that .

 

As you have probably guessed, this EFF company has said "Google Copies Your Hard Drive - Government Smiles in Anticipation" in their main title. But, if you read into the article, you'll find this line.

 

 

But wait a second. Didn't they say COPIES YOUR HARD DRIVE. Hmmmm. Well, I think I best re-check my hard drive to find the numerous other file types. Perhaps they have disappeared, and all that remains is Word Documents, PDFs, Spreadsheets and TEXT files. If that was the case, then Microsoft Windows would certainly look a lot different

 

Although they do have a slight point following:

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.

Have they never heard of antivirus or even hardware firewalls? If Google are having this feature, then I suspect they will have the best protection behind storing those files. Afterall, they would be liable for damages.

 

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.

Sorry, but if you are STUPID enough to put this type of information onto your computer, then it is your own doing. Google are providing a genuine service, and the EFF are nit-picking. Anyone with half a brain, will not put tax returns, love letters (lmfao, who wrot this bs) or any other private document onto their computers.

 

Medical files are kept safe in computers with hardware firewalls. If they don't, then they can be charged with violating the Data Protection Act 1998.

 

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.

So? If you get your things taken, then there must be a valid reason. If and when they are taken, use your rights to get them back. And chances are, they aren't going to take the document, but rather a copy of it.

 

The privacy problem arises because the Electronic Communication Privacy Act of 1986, or ECPA, 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. And even that lower level of legal protection could disappear if Google uses your data for marketing purposes. 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.

OMG OMG OMG. The ECPA has been targeted to be updated, along with international Data Protection Acts. When you send your private data through any form of electronic communication, it is at risk. Just because it is being stored at Google won't increase the risk, in fact it is more than likely going to reduce it.

 

Google, use your private data as marketing purposes. HAHAHA. To quote myself:

Sorry, but if you are STUPID enough to put this type of information onto your computer, then it is your own doing. Google are providing a genuine service, and the EFF are nit-picking. Anyone with half a brain, will not put tax returns, love letters (lmfao, who wrot this bs) or any other private document onto their computers.

The only type of documents you should ever have on your computer are those that aren't private or confidential. If you do have these types of documents, then at least have the brain power to either set-up the Share Computer thing properly, or simply take the documents off and load them onto a secure memory stick.

 

So, all in all, the EFF are a set of busy-bodies that don't realise that people need to make mistakes in order to learn from them. If anyone is stupid enough to put private documents on a computer and not protect themselves are in the firing line for a multitude of problems.

 

Just recently, I looked at a site that was beating against GMail. You can bet who that was sponsored by It went on about the adsense eventually leading to a corrupt sex promotion on little kiddies computers. Sad.

 

 

Anyway, after my long rant, I'd like to see your response.

 

 

--mik

Well, a lot of who put different things on their computer, especially if they are the only people who are using it, I don't agree that you shouldn't put anything on it, so why do I need the computer ? for playing games ? or for watching porno films ? People write diary's, books and more stuff using their computers, their thoughts and stuff.I am against things like that, I don't want to allow anyone to store my information out of my computer without my permission, it is my information and if I would want someone to have it I would share it. People have text files with their passwords and logins and stuff, so you're telling me that it is dangerous to have it ? so where should I put all my private things ? write it on paper like they did it in the world world 2 ? or I need to encrypt everything like an idiot on my personal computer, or I need to be offline ? *BLEEP*.Good that this is only Nonsense.

Cryptic clues. Lol.What I am trying to say is that if you do put person information on your computer that you don't want to share, then make sure you properly configure Google Desktop. IF you don't configure it properly, and use the feature mentioned, then you only have yourself to blame.

A lot of people have to use a computer in order to write down their private documents (letters claiming for income tax reductions, letters to their doctor describint their health problems).Most of them use google. Most of them are the only users of their computers. And most of them don't know how to protect themselves from other people. And most of them would not like their love letters to be correctly copied and archived and indexed on a google computer in order to be easily accessed by everybody in the world.And of course, the sentance "carefully verify that you correctly configured this software" is not at all a good explanation, "get away from that !" whould be a better approach.

twitch, the reason the EFF cares is becauseA)Most computer users trust there systems, therefor they will keep much personal data on there (even if we know you shouldn't unless its well protected)B)The average person is likely to trust an app from googleC)Google is making their data much more vulnerable.Now I didn't read your whole post as I read the original articles about this all a week or so ago, however I did notice you said they would have the datat all firewalled. That isn't the point of the EFF's arguments. They are saying if the government gets a subpoena (apparently quite easy to do, it's not even as hard as getting a search warrant) BOOM, they'll have access to all of googles data for a certain person. This is a pretty hardcore violation of privacy, ESPECIALLY if they start turning this feature on by default. While google will make sure to cover there legal *bottom* (putting it in the eula or whatever) they still shouldn't do doing this stuff. I don't care if it's a "genuine service" they are trying to offer, this is a bad way to go about it.You kept saying people would be stupid to have personal data on a computer. Well then you just insulted a shitload of people, because in case you haven't noticed ALOT of the world is run by computers now. Plus someone can have an amazing firewall... and if they get google desktop and dont know of this new feature, all of a sudden they authorized their data to be a subpoena away from being viewed by the government or whoever. I wish the US gov was too busy tapping their citizens phones to not care about this, but I'm sure that's not the case.But yes to summarize, everytime you said that important data should be firewalled... irrelevant if this program copies the data out through a program you are letting communicate past the firewall. The EFF knows what they are doing, I'm glad they are at least making google realize this might not have been a good choice. Now, if they release it as a seperate download which blatently states "YOUR DATA SHALL BE COPIED ONTO OUR CORPORATE SERVERS FOR SEARCH USE" that is fine, people will then either know what they are doing or are too lazy to read to care. But users should not be expected to have to check all the new options in the option menu of a prog every time they download an update for it or else their data gets copied to google's servers without them knowing :S</rant>

Edited February 15, 2006 by Jeigh (see edit history)

Sorry, but if you are STUPID enough to put this type of information onto your computer, then it is your own doing. Google are providing a genuine service, and the EFF are nit-picking. Anyone with half a brain, will not put tax returns, love letters (lmfao, who wrot this bs) or any other private document onto their computers.

What is this supposed to mean? Everyone stores everything on thier computer, storing things like tax returns just makes things easier for you.

The only type of documents you should ever have on your computer are those that aren't private or confidential.

I completly dissagree, there is nothing wrong with people storing private documents on thier personal computers, if they dont take the proper precautions to protect private documents they shouldnt have them. If you know you cant keep a private paper/letter private, destroy it...

As for google, i dont really agree with the copying all text based documents onto thier servers but how else will they index your computer? And if im not mistaking, this is all said in the Agreement which you should have read and agreed to.

I don't see a problem with what google is doing. If you want to use their software, you can, and if you don't understand how their software works, then you should do some reading before throwing it on your computer.