Information Commissioner: Google Does Not Care
Google may fundamentally be a search engine, but with their ever growing services on the web and on mobile phones, it comes as to no surprise that they are starting to gain hold of some very delicate bits of information; information that many government officials all over the world feel is something that the major developer should be taking care off a little better.
The words of local information commissioner Christopher Graham raise a certain degree of worry about reckless with the information gathering and information usage practices of Google.
First off, there was a major buzz about the newly launched Google Buzz. The reason for this was that it made public many people’s personal email contacts lists. This was done by automatically linking the Buzz service to all Gmail users.
For anyone unfamiliar with Buzz, it is akin to Google’s own version of Twitter and Facebook, but using Gmail as a base service. With it, people are automatically given a network of friends using the existing contacts information each Gmail user has. This list of contacts is then made accessible to everyone in your network –which means that private email contacts are made known to all your followers.
The gathering of images and data for Google’s Street view service has also raised plenty of concerns as the Google camera car failed to warn people that it was in the vicinity taking images. While all visual data are sights that can be seen from street level, it would have been nice if people had a chance to close their windows or vacate their lawns instead of letting street view catch some personal moments to be posted online.
Google has gone a long way from being just a search engine, but they still need to be careful about what they step on in their climb to the top. Meanwhile Google Android is going from strength to strength, with phones such as the new HTC Desire attracting a lot of attention. You can find the latest HTC Desire contracts at Moby1, who compare all the latest mobile phone contract deals. If you need a new phone but are uncertain which to get then you can always read one of the many informative phone reviews first.