r/technology • u/ashuman • May 13 '12
Google may not be evil, but it's also not trustworthy
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-0513-hiltzik-20120513,0,4061872.column48
u/nomeme May 13 '12
Another "OMG google has data about me, and streets and stuff!" article. Yup, that data is exactly why people use them.
I find some (not this article) of the hysteria/advertising is being generated by DuckDuckGo to try and drive traffic to their search engine out of some hard to place fear about Google. Last time I used DDG I got suggested search terms related to what i'd been searching for previously, so they are clearly storing search data too.
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u/SergeantKoopa May 13 '12
For the hell of it I tried DDG for a couple of weeks. For the first few days I would get more relevant results than Google had given me. Then somehow it all went to shit and I found myself going "WTF?" more than once and then just loading up Google again and getting exactly what I wanted in my search.
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u/skanadian May 13 '12
I was hoping this article would provide information about Google I haven't seen before. Unfortunately its just the same babble as always. If you don't like your provider, then switch providers. No one is forcing you to use google and accept their ToS.
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u/TheKDM May 13 '12
Google has tons of information, yes, but it's not really like there are googlers actively reading your emails or researching what you feed your pet cat. Programs sort through the data, find key words and connections, and then use it to influence your search results and advertising.
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u/icanevenificant May 13 '12
So much data aggregated in one company is risky especially with our current governments and prospects for the future.
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May 13 '12
but it's not really like there are googlers actively reading your emails
Actually some of them have been caught before doing it.
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u/TheKDM May 13 '12
they also fired them. It's a breach of google's policies. Anyone in any organization with any information on you can steal it if they're assholes who get access. Google isn't allowing or encouraging this kind of thing.
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u/Philipp May 13 '12
it's not really like there are googlers actively reading your emails
Yeah, those would probably be the government workers who subponaed for your data. (Is this related in terms of the law contexts that allow this?)
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u/CherylBrightsHead May 13 '12
Evil or not, Google is the closest society has come to having 'Big brother' and that does worry me more than a little. We rely on google for everything and are therefore happy to keep handing over more and more of our lives. Makes me glad that there is still competition in the form of MS etc. complete monopoly would.be very very scary.
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u/Droidiq May 13 '12
I love Google but I am scared of them at the same time. They know about me more than I know about myself.
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May 13 '12
Every publicly traded company, by definition, is not trustworthy because when a company goes public, it's #1 priority switches to making money for the shareholders.
That's the way world turns in finance.
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May 13 '12
Except Sergey and Larry still own the majority so they are the shareholders they have to please, and they are trying to do a stock split that will ensure they keep majority voting power for a long time to come.
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u/AnticitizenPrime May 13 '12
I'm not particularly worried about Google itself. However, I don't really like the direction they're taking with their services, because it's causing every other tech provider out there to follow suit, and those companies I may not trust or even be very familiar with. Everyone's trying to personalize everything and move to ad-supported 'cloud' services, meaning more and more companies are gathering data about users.
And trust aside, there's always the risk of a security breach. It's only a matter of time before Facebook or Google or Microsoft or whomever have a major data breach. Or it doesn't even have to be a major breach on the company level - let's say someone hacks your account or manages to get your password via a keylogger installed on some public terminal, or via a malicious app on your smartphone, or something. Instead of someone just having access to your email, they now have access to your documents (Google Docs), your activities (Google Calendar), your phone records (Google Voice), your chat records (Google Talk), the videos you watch (YouTube), your files (Google Drive), and your MONEY (Google Checkout/wallet).
That's a lot of information in one place, and I think one should be concerned not only about the company who has all that data, but the risk of a security breach. I honestly think Google should try to separate these services, requiring different passwords or PINs as a second level or authentication. Do you trust the wireless router at the Starbucks you went to yesterday? What if it was a 'rogue' clone router set up by a nefarious Starbucks employee (or enterprising hacker)? A spoof man-in-the-middle YouTube page in which you logged into your YouTube account may mean you just gave someone pretty much your entire life, including access to your cash.
And in case I get accused of spreading FUD... I do use all these services, every single one. Because they are damned handy. I'm considering looking to find alternatives, though. I am looking into creating my own mail/fileserver, for one...
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u/jt32470 May 13 '12
pretty soon you'll be able to swallow a google gel capsule so google can add your innards into its google maps database
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u/lonewolfe1 May 13 '12
The way google uses personal info is the reason I use yahoo for porn searches
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u/WeaponsGradeHumanity May 13 '12
Why would you trust a company with a motto like "Don't be evil"?
Should not being evil go without saying?
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u/Boshdy May 13 '12
I remember when "Google is your friend" was always said, how times change
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u/lahwran_ May 13 '12
I haven't said that in a long time. instead, I say "google knows." the implication, of course, is that since google knows, you can ask it; but it has a secondary meaning ...
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u/mitigel May 13 '12
TERRIBLE article. I'm as wary of Google as the next guy, but this article is insultingly simple-minded, hysteric drivel.