Storing your files on Google’s server is not a good idea
I was going to write something long about this, but Kevin Bankston of the EFF has beaten me to it and put together pretty much everything I was going to say.
Here’s the original piece:
http://www.eff.org/news/archives/2006_02.php#004400
In response to a criticism on the IP list that this piece was too hard on Google, Kevin wrote the following, which I reproduce here verbatim with permission. I think that this does an excellent job of summing up how I feel about these privacy issues. I have nothing personally against Google, or any of the other companies that I often “pick on” in pointing out potential flaws. I do think that somewhere along the way in getting to where we are now, we have lost some important things in the areas of corporate responsibility and consumer protections, and technology has advanced to the point where it’s not even obvious what has been lost. The tough thing is that there are often tradeoffs with useful functionality, and it’s not clear what you’re giving up in order to make use of that potential new feature.
So, in this case – yeah, it’s great that you can search your files from more than one computer, but Google hasn’t warned you that your doing so by their method, under the current law, exposes your private data to less rigorous protections from search by various parties than it would be if it were left on your own computer. To most people, it doesn’t make any difference where their files are stored. To a lawyer with a subpoena in hand, it does. These are important distinctions, and they’re not being made to the general public. I believe it is the responsibility of those who understand these risks to bring this dialogue to those who don’t. It’s a a big part of why I write this blog.
Kevin’s response:
Thanks for your feedback. I’m sorry if you found our press release inappropriately hostile to Google, although I would say it was appropriately hostile–not to Google or its folk, but to the use of this product, which we do think poses a serious privacy risk.
Certainly, the ability to search across computers is a helpful thing, but considering that we are advocating against the use this particular product for that purpose, I’m not sure why we would include such a (fairly obvious) proposition in the release. And as to tone, well, again, the goal was to warn people off of this product, and you’re not going to do that by using weak language. Certainly, we’re not out to personally or unfairly attack the people at Google. Indeed, we work with them on a variety of non-privacy issues (and sometimes privacy issues, too). But it’s our job to forcefully point out when they are marketing a product that we think is a dangerous to consumers’ privacy, and dropping in little caveats about how clever Google’s engineers are or how useful their products can be is unnecessary and counterproductive to that purpose.
I think it’s clear from the PR that our biggest problem here is with the law. But we are also very unhappy with companies–including but not limited to Google–that design and encourage consumers to use products that, in combination with the current state of the law, are bad for user privacy. Google could have developed a Search Across Computers product that addressed these problems, either by not storing the data on Google servers there are and long have been similar remote access tools that do not rely on third party storage), or by storing the data in encrypted form such that only the user could retrieve it (it is encrypted on Google’s servers now, but Google has the key).
However, both of those design options would be inconsistent with one of Google’s most common goals: amassing user data as grist for the ad-targeting mill (otherwise known, by Google, as “delivering the best possible service to you”). As mentioned in the PR, Google says it is not scanning the files for that purpose yet, but has not ruled it out, and the current privacy policy on its face would seem to allow it. And although I for one have no problem with consensual ad-scanning per se, which technically is not much different than spam-filtering in its invasiveness, I do have a very big problem with a product that by design makes ad-scanning possible at the cost of user privacy. This is the same reason EFF objected to Gmail: not because of the ad-scanning itself, but the fact that Google was encouraging users, in its press and by the design of the product, to never delete their emails even though the legal protection for those stored communications are significantly reduced with time.
If Google wants to “not be evil” and continue to market products like this, which rely on or encourage storing masses of personal data with Google, it has a responsibility as an industry leader to publicly mobilize resources toward reforming the law and actively educating its users about the legal risks. Until the law is fixed, Google can and should be doing its best to design around the legal pitfalls, placing a premium on user privacy rather than on Google’s own access to user’s data. Unfortunately, rather than treating user privacy as a design priority and a lobbying goal, Google mostly seems to consider it a public relations issue. That being the case, it’s EFF’s job to counter their publicity, by forcefully warning the public of the risks and demanding that Google act as a responsible corporate citizen.
Once again, another reason why you should be donating money to the EFF. Do it now.
