Google, kinda spooky
Reader Carl emails this bit:
Google’s recent legal spat with the U.S. Department of Justice highlights not only what information search engines record about us but also the shortcomings in a federal law that’s supposed to protect online privacy.
It’s only a matter of time before other attorneys realize that a person’s entire search history is available for the asking, and the subpoenas begin to fly. This could happen in civil lawsuits or criminal prosecutions.
That type of fishing expedition is not legally permitted for Web mail providers. But because search engines are not fully shielded by the 1986 Electronic Communications Privacy Act–concocted back in the era of CompuServe and bulletin board systems–their users don’t enjoy the same level of privacy.
There’s also an FAQ on stuff Google does.
March 3rd, 2006 at 5:50 pm
How the hell does google know what I’ve searched for?
I don’t have a static IP address, each time I log on to the internet my provider assigns me a different one. They can all be traced to that provider, but I know they don’t keep those records and have signalled their unwillingness to provide that information (based on their positioning regarding the music industries subpeonas). Besides, it would be awfully difficult to prove that its me who did the search on google.
March 3rd, 2006 at 6:57 pm
Cookies?
March 3rd, 2006 at 7:38 pm
If you upchuck your google cookies, and/or zero your google cookie and change your IP address, it does make it that more difficult for google to track you, but you haven’t covered the bases by a long shot.
First, even if Verizon doesn’t want to share those records, they may still roll over for a “National Security Letter” from the overlords. Here’s where you can freely call me paranoid. I believe that these “National Security Letters” are being abused beyond national security, as there is no public oversight.
Second, Flash cookies. Do you visit a site that has at least one Google video most everyday? There’s a way for content providers to place small files on your drive and retrieve them when you visit their site. Nicknamed “flash cookies” you should be able to right click on a flash movie and set exactly how much space you wish to allow the provider to use on your hard drive. I’ve never seen anything not work when you block flash cookies, but if there’s a pac-man emulator somewhere out there that runs via flash, it might not save your high score.
Third (and not finally) there’s a cool extension for firefox called “CustomizeGoogle” that lets you block snoopy google stuff at least a half dozen ways. It looks pretty cool, but I’m still evaluating it.
There’s a few tricks that I don’t think google uses, like javascript that takes control of your email program and mails the malware/website author an email message from your account, and probably a few other tricks I don’t know about yet. but yea, there’s more than just cookies.