Let's see if the herd remains silent on this...
Google, after all is a Linux friendly company so they will most
likely get a pass from the slimy FOSS and Linux community.
If this had been Microsoft, well... You know...
Have fun Linturds!
Happy reading!
http://www.infoworld.com/t/cringely...ses-192061
http://tinyurl.com/d4ga5mx
"Google admits it knowingly gathered sensitive data from unprotected
Wi-Fi networks with Street View and did nothing to stop it. The FCC
fine: Pocket change"
"Remember how surprised Google was when it found out that its Street
View vans had slurped up some 600GB of juicy personal information
from unprotected Wi-Fi networks as they drove by snapping photos of
our homes?
It turns out Google knew about it all along but did nothing to stop
it. Oops."
"Late last week, Google released a redacted version of the FCC
report on its Street View probe [PDF]. It turns out that, yes, that
Wi-Fi spying was deliberate, and yes, the entire Street View Team
was informed about it, though whether that knowledge made it to
three-headed dog at the top of the Google food chain is unclear.
It is a damning document. But before we get into that, let's step
back into the Wayback Machine and take a look at what Google said on
April 27, 2010, when the German government's Data Protection
Authority first accused Google of Wi-Fi spying:
... we do not collect any information about householders, we
cannot identify an individual from the location data Google collects
via its Street View carsWe do not believe it is illegal -- this
is all publicly broadcast information which is accessible to anyone
with a Wi-Fi-enabled device.
Two weeks later, Google issued a "clarification and an update,"
admitting its earlier blog post was, well, a lie. Google also
claimed that the bits of data hoovered up by its Street View vans
were merely random snippets that could not be used to identify
individuals.
...it's now clear that we have been mistakenly collecting
samples of payload data from open (i.e. non-password-protected)
Wi-Fi networks, even though we never used that data in any Google
products So how did this happen? Quite simply, it was a mistake.
In 2006 an engineer working on an experimental Wi-Fi project wrote a
piece of code that sampled all categories of publicly broadcast
Wi-Fi data. A year later, when our mobile team started a project to
collect basic Wi-Fi network data like SSID information and MAC
addresses using Google's Street View cars, they included that code
in their software -- although the project leaders did not want, and
had no intention of using, payload data.
In an October 2010 blog post, Google admitted that "in some
instances entire emails and URLs were captured, as well as
passwords.""
"Now of course we have the FCC report on the matter, which concludes
that, yet again, Google was lying. According to Google's internal
documents, the engineer who developed the software Google used to
ping unprotected Wi-Fi networks designed it for scooping up this
data and even acknowledged that privacy might be a concern (but not
enough of one to ever consult with Google's in-house counsel). So
much for the "oops" defense. Per the FCC report:
Engineer Doe intended to collect, store, and analyze payload
data from unencrypted Wi-Fi networks. ... In a discussion of
"Privacy Considerations," the design document states, "A typical
concern might be that we are logging user traffic along with
sufficient data to precisely triangulate their position at a given
time, along with information about what they were doing."
What kind of "user traffic" did that Google spyware uncover? Oh,
just names, phone numbers, mailing addresses, IP addresses, entire
email messages, cookies, chat sessions, search terms, medical
information, passwords, snippets of video and audio files, and
log-ins to dating networks and porn sites.
That information, by the way, comes from investigations by
governments in Canada, France, and the Netherlands. Google wouldn't
allow the FCC to look at the data it collected, and the FCC dropped
the matter. (If you want an argument for EU-style privacy laws, I
can't think of a better one.)
That wasn't the only time Google was uncooperative. Per the report,
Google dragged its feet for years and produced the bare minimum
information required, removing the names of all the relevant
personnel. It appears that Google still respects the privacy of its
own employees, if not the world's citizens.
Despite all of this Google is still clinging to the Sergeant Schultz
defense, claiming it knew nothink until May 2010. Why? Apparently
its Street View team didn't read the emails detailing the Wi-Fi
spying; didn't notice what information the software was collecting,
even after going line by line through the code several times and
testing it thoroughly; and didn't remember discussing it with
Engineer Doe when he brought it up in conversations with two of his
bosses or when he asked Google's search team if they could use any
of the data he'd collected. (They said no.)
For these crimes, the FCC fined Google the kingly sum of $25,000 --
or about the amount of spare change CEO Larry Page keeps in his
pocket to pay parking meters -- mostly for failing to respond to its
inquiries in a complete and timely manner.
Now there's an effective deterrent.
Who's to blame here? Clearly Google believes it can do whatever it
wants with our data and get away with it. Just as clearly, the FCC
is either feebler -- or more corrupt -- than it looks. But we who
depend on Google for our searching/email/document/blogging yadda
yadda needs are also to blame. Because if we don't punish Google for
its bad behavior, who else will?"
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May 18th, 2013 - 2:40 PM ET
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