Google - Privacy and other issues

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movietub

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  • #161
    bdw said:
    You do not seriously believe that this was an accident do you? The absurdity of this claim has been discussed by people involved in software since it was first uttered. Software cannot invent features by itself (or by accident).

    Oh and how could a car whose sole function was to take images for streetview possibly record this type of information "by accident"? :rolleyes:

    .
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    Because the sole purpose of those cars was not just to take photos. It was to scan passing wifi networks to discover the ones offerinf public unsecured connections so they could be catalogued for public use. It was also to identify IP and strength of every signal so it could be used as a satellite free navigation system in the near future.

    In order to identify netwoks the software captured and briefly cached passing packets of data (they are cached in order to pickup communication again if the signal is lost). The same thing happens when your mobile phone 'discovers' a new network. A fraction of this data was cached and then not thoroughly removed in turn. This is because the software had already been mangled together from bits of other google software for other projects.

    The point is, that the fact google inadvertently kept the tiniest, tiniest, tiniest amount of data, 99.9999999% of which is complete junk anyway, is irrelevant. All the data they could have got this way is still being broadcast publicly by the same people. Your router, right now, is creating a cloud of information around you which can be read by anyone. Send an unencrypted email, and I could read it if I was nearby. Assuming I could be bothered to assemble many meaningless packets of data and piece them back into recognizable data. Frankly, it would be easier to simply mug you and take your cards.
     
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    movietub

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  • #167
    Gillie said:
    Ok have to ask, the thread title is google - privacy and other issues .... we have done the privacy thing to death - and those daft enough to think that google are the only ones who know most stuff about us all - needs their bumps feeling ... so what are the other 'issues'??
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    I think the OP may be a daily mail reader. There really are no privacy issues worth a debate. No ones data is at risk unless they welcome it thorugh laziness or ignorance. Pretty much the same could be said about wallets before the 'evil' internet existed...

    Worse still, I'm not entirely sure the OP has the faintest idea what Google actually did, or what the purpose of this thread was.
     
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    bdw

  • #170
    I think the OP may be a daily mail reader.
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    I think some of you in here are behaving like general issue forum smart asses, people who post smug, caustic comments about folk they don't know while hiding behind a keyboard. Can I just say that I am happy for you disagree with me. Discuss this with me if you will. Help me if you will and correct me if you will but please don't act like a smart ass just because we are not face to face.

    There really are no privacy issues worth a debate.
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    Why then is it being discussed in parliament? Why are governments all over the world now sitting up and taking note of what is going on?

    Worse still, I'm not entirely sure the OP has the faintest idea what Google actually did, or what the purpose of this thread was
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    I explained the purpose of the thread in the first post but unlike some of you I have no problem admitting that I am not an expert and that I don't fully understand privacy issues at Google. I will also freely admit that I have no experience of wireless or wifi signal transmission, packet data or whatver so I am not the best one to comment on the technicalities of that particular case.

    I do however know what Google did. They recorded data that included the personal and private information of many thousands of people. Someone made the point that they admitted that they had done this. That is true but only after they had earlier denied it. Had it been discovered by anyone else after they had denied it they would have been in massive trouble. Admitting it was clearly the only option open to them at that stage.

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8684639.stm

    Who knows what other information they have yet to admit to collecting.
     
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  • #171
    Oh great now the experts think google can read your e-mails,

    Just think of all those business's that use paypal and other payment gateways having there payments read by big brother and the marketing targeting possibilities.:|

    I do wonder if I am paranoid enough.:p

    I suspect people may have an image of google being a couple of clean cut college kids in a garage making it big.

    The reality is that its long past from there control ,and is probably well under the control of accountants like many big business's.

    Earl
     
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    movietub

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  • #172
    bdw said:
    I think some of you in here are behaving like general issue forum smart asses, people who post smug, caustic comments about folk they don't know while hiding behind a keyboard. Can I just say that I am happy for you disagree with me. Discuss this with me if you will. Help me if you will and correct me if you will but please don't act like a smart ass just because we are not face to face.
    Click to expand...

    You're right I don't know you. But I'm afraid that during heated debate I do have a habit of passing the odd insult... Calling someone a Daily Mail reader when they voice their views as fact but later admits a lack of understanding is absolutely a tongue in cheek remark I would make face to face. You should remeber that whilst we are 'hiding' behind our keyboards, it is also difficult to sense the tone of a persons comment.

    bdw said:
    Why then is it being discussed in parliament? Why are governments all over the world now sitting up and taking note of what is going on?
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    Because it's a hot topic for many reasons. Cyber terrorism is gearing up to be the new fear on the streets. People are all to ready to worry to about what Google are up to. Enough media coverage on an particular incident and the poloticians start to make statements and discuss publicly.

    bdw said:
    I explained the purpose of the thread in the first post but unlike some of you I have no problem admitting that I am not an expert and that I don't fully understand privacy issues at Google. I will also freely admit that I have no experience of wireless or wifi signal transmission, packet data or whatver so I am not the best one to comment on the technicalities of that particular case.
    Click to expand...

    You said your intent was to catalogue Google's mis-doings for discussion. What right do you have to catalogue another companies supposed mis-doings whilst there is still a very valid debate as to whether they really did anything wrong at all. The problem you now have, is that even though the techies make up the minority, they know as fact that Google have done nothing 'wrong' wrong at all.

    bdw said:
    I do however know what Google did. They recorded data that included the personal and private information of many thousands of people. Someone made the point that they admitted that they had done this. That is true but only after they had earlier denied it. Had it been discovered by anyone else after they had denied it they would have been in massive trouble. Admitting it was clearly the only option open to them at that stage.

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8684639.stm

    Who knows what other information they have yet to admit to collecting.
    Click to expand...

    What did Google deny? They denied they had been collecting data, because they had not been actively collecting data. I would deny I steal sand from the beech, yet a a tiny % of my suitcase when I flew back from Greece earlier this year was sand. There must have been a few grains in there.

    Morever the people the 'senstive' data was not recorded in any meaningful way by Google at all. It was later handed over to various third parties that reported it was possible, with a lot of faff, to piece a fraction of it back into readable data.

    There is no conspiracy here. There is no reason Google have to want to do any of the things suggested. They already have a monopoly on internet advertising that they power with data they openly and legally collect.

    My point is, that without understanding the technical side of what actually happened, you don't know enough to describe any of what they did as wrong.
     
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    movietub

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  • #174
    Jeff Knows said:
    Today I learned Movietub is a multi-national sand thief. Don't you think Greece has enough problems already without you nicking there sand? You heartless git!
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    :D

    I apologise to the Germans - I think they bought Greece a few months ago...

    It's actually more valid to call me a sand theif than Google an data thief. There is no way I can deny it. The thin veneer of sand on the soles of my flip-flops represents a much higher % of theft than the microscopic fraction of a % of data Google dragged back by mistake after driving down each civilised street on the entire planet.

    What a sad world we would live in if our race had the ability to photograph the occupied planet at ground level, but we chose not to because of a few inevitable hiccups.
     
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    bdw

  • #175
    You said your intent was to catalogue Google's mis-doings for discussion. What right do you have to catalogue another companies supposed mis-doings whilst there is still a very valid debate as to whether they really did anything wrong at all.
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    I did not say that at all so please do not misquote me. It does not strengthen your case in anyway. What I did say was ...
    A lot of stories have surfaced during the last few months about Google and privacy issues. I thought it would be a good idea if we documented some of these here to see exactly where they are heading.
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    And in any case what right to do have to tell me what I can and cannot do with publicly available information?

    Once again I am surprised at the aggression that this thread has generated. What is it that makes all of you guys so defensive about Google. Don't you think they are capable of defending themselves? If you don't like this thread then why upset yourself further by continuing to hang around? Why not just leave us to it?
     
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    Jeff Knows

  • #176
    bdw said:
    I did not say that at all so please do not misquote me. It does not strengthen your case in anyway. What I did say was ...
    And in any case what right to do have to tell me what I can and cannot do with publicly available information?

    Once again I am surprised at the aggression that this thread has generated. What is it that makes all of you guys so defensive about Google. Don't you think they are capable of defending themselves? If you don't like this thread then why upset yourself further by continuing to hang around? Why not just leave us to it?
    Click to expand...

    Oh please give it up with the 'I just want to discuss' trash you keep peddling. It's clear to see for anyone reading this you have an agenda, you are pretty much a conspiracy theorist. You claim you posted this on a public forum for discussion, the least you could do is defend your viewpoint. Instead you just keep fobbing people off, telling anyone with a counter point they are being abusive or just straight up asking people to go away.

    To my knowledge Google have not ever done anything nefarious in regards to their customers. There have been blunders along the way, major blunders, like when Buzz was released. However they are acknowledge and fixed. If you want nefarious activity how about when Facebook decided anybody you were connected with could tell the world your location whether you want them to or not. An issue they still haven't acknowledged or fixed, they just bury an option somewhere and don't bother telling anyone.
     
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    movietub

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  • #177
    bdw said:
    I did not say that at all so please do not misquote me. It does not strengthen your case in anyway. What I did say was ...
    And in any case what right to do have to tell me what I can and cannot do with publicly available information?

    Once again I am surprised at the aggression that this thread has generated. What is it that makes all of you guys so defensive about Google. Don't you think they are capable of defending themselves? If you don't like this thread then why upset yourself further by continuing to hang around? Why not just leave us to it?
    Click to expand...

    You did say that, although you said it slightly differently! I'm not telling you not to do anything. I am saying that it is slanderous to present the information in a 'What has Google done wrong' way. All your facts and links point only to the fact that Google is involved in some stuff that people often find sounds scary. There nothing in anything that you have said that would cause a technical minded person to do anything more than shrug, and wonder what the fuss is about.

    What makes us defend Google? So far as I can see (myself included) people are only defending the facts behind the stories. It wouldn't matter if those facts proved Google was clean or grimey. People are attacking your crude use of headlines and the absence of actual knowledge or understanding to back any of them up.

    I have a question then:

    If you admit to not understanding the technical side of what is clearly a technical isssue/incident. Why have you said you 'know' what Google did and that it was wrong? And also, without that knowledge, why do you consider yourself a suitable person to start a thread which could be concieved as 'Anti Google'? You must have started this for some reason!
     
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    movietub

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  • #178
    bdw said:
    A lot of stories have surfaced during the last few months about Google and privacy issues. I thought it would be a good idea if we documented some of these here to see exactly where they are heading.
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    Is that not what people are doing? How can we 'see where they are heading' without looking into the facts of what actually happened? It's not the fault of the techies on here that the facts reveal that it was a lot of fuss over nothing of substance.

    I really don't understand what you want people to discuss. Apparently it's not the subject of the thread which is up for discsussion - so what?
     
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    bdw

  • #185
    The results of the back bench debate last week . . .

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-11650692

    I find it hard to believe that a company with the creative genius and originality of Google could map the personal wi-fi details, computer passwords and e-mail addresses of millions of people across the world and not know what it was doing”

    Robert Halfon Conservative MP
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    bdw

  • #190
    Then you too don't understand it.
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    Oh but I can assure you that I do. Have you heard of version control?

    During the late eighties and early nineties part of my duties (while working for a multi national) involved software engineering. Even then, over twenty years ago, we could tell you specifically who had done what and when to any program. This is not only standard practice but a necessity in software development. That is why I (and that MP) know that Google's claims that it happened accidentally are nonsense. People are absolutely not given a free hand in development situations like this and it is wrong to suggest otherwise.

    I have been monitoring discussions on this on other forums where there is no shortage of real experts and I can tell you that they all agree that Google (despite their claims to the contrary) must have known exactly what they were doing. Most experts are now of the opinion that Google's business is more and more geared around pushing the privacy limits to the absolute boundaries to see what they can get away with.
     
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    stugster

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  • #192
    bdw said:
    During the late eighties and early nineties part of my duties (while working for a multi national) involved software engineering. Even then, over twenty years ago, we could tell you specifically who had done what and when to any program. This is not only standard practice but a necessity in software development. That is why I (and that MP) know that Google's claims that it happened accidentally are nonsense. People are absolutely not given a free hand in development situations like this and it is wrong to suggest otherwise.
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    I think this is part of your problem. You're living in the eighties.

    You don't understand the freedom the people working at Google are given to code projects just purely for the fun and where it'll lead them. Google long ago realised that remuneration didn't equate to better productivity, and that giving their staff specific time out to do whatever they liked accumulated in a vast store of useful programs.

    In this instance, the code that was used was retrieved from the Google labs, probably created by someone for whatever reason. The person that created it likely has absolutely no involvement whatsoever in the Street side of Google, just as he has no involvement in the Google Mail side of Google, or the Human Resources side of Google.

    Whatever he does, what has likely happened is he's created a wonderful piece of software, put it in the labs (as open source by the way), and someone involved in the Street view project has taken it and used it.

    The programmer should have no liability, no responsibility, and no bloody involvement at any sort of level with the mess the Google Street guys have created for themselves.

    This my friend, is your and the MP's flawed understanding of what's really going on here and why they've called upon the poor sod who has nothing to do with it for questioning.

    bdw said:
    Oh but I can assure you that I do. Have you heard of version control?
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    I bring this quote into play for the reason of my earlier quote: "It [MPs] has pressed Google to name the engineer responsible and to explain in full how the code he designed came to be incorporated in Street View."

    This, again, shows no understanding.
     
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    bdw

  • #197
    In this instance, the code that was used was retrieved from the Google labs, probably created by someone for whatever reason. The person that created it likely has absolutely no involvement whatsoever in the Street side of Google, just as he has no involvement in the Google Mail side of Google, or the Human Resources side of Google.

    Whatever he does, what has likely happened is he's created a wonderful piece of software, put it in the labs (as open source by the way), and someone involved in the Street view project has taken it and used it.
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    Wow! You really seem to believe that this could happen. :eek:

    version control

    .
     
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    bdw

  • #200
    bdw, your personal vendetta keeps showing through.
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    Personal vendetta my @ss. I have no personal vendetta against Google. I am only reporting facts and expressing my opinion, which is that Google is not the public spirited big teddy bear that some of you seem to think it is and I am not alone in this opinion.

    I have no problem in discussing this with people who take the opposite view provided they remain courteous and respectful of other opinions. Re vendettas, perhaps you should consider your own personal vendetta against me? After all it was you who introduced irrelevant, untrue comments in an attempt to discredit me a few days ago? Can't we just discuss this like adults?

    Vendettas indeed! What surprises me with this thread is that it is the pro Google party that seems to be getting most upset, which is not what I would have expected.

    When was the last time you read this and really considered its implications?
    http://www.google.com/intl/en/privacypolicy.html

    .
     
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