Picking Google’s Security Boil
January 28, 2009
Johnny Doe (original name!), writing on Wiseperception.com here, takes a rough finger nail and digs into Google’s security scab. The core of the article is information gathered by an Austrian professor named Hermann Maurer. After my Google 2.0 study appeared, I received several queries from folks in Europe wanting me to provide information about Google that was negative. I refused. I read patent applications and technical papers. Not Herr Dr. Maurer. The academic is asserting that Google has data about users and can assemble those data into profiles. No kidding. The news, Herr Dr. Maurer, is old. The privacy and security boils on Googzilla’s snout are pretty obvious as well. For me the most interesting comment in this article was:
He [Herr Dr. Maurer] also speculates on the possibility of Governments paying Google for information on an opponent, or to block their citizens’ access to servers. “If Google did this they wouldn’t be doing anything illegal. They have this information, they are a company, why not sell it?” Maurer says.
Great idea. The only problem is that Google remains sufficiently disorganized that government officials have trouble getting a Googler to return their calls. My thought is that Europe is going to be a giant thorn in Googzilla’s paw with regard to privacy. Microsoft and other competitors have avoided tackling Google head on on this matter. Looks like the good Herr Doctor won’t be a shrinking violet. Herr Dr. Maurer may be the first of European Google watchers to poke Google’s security boil.
Stephen Arnold, January 28, 2009
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