Info on microsoft google privacy controversy
While Google has been busy telling its users to pay attention to its privacy policies, something that has created a lot of uproar in the tech circles and simultaneously raised red flag in the eyes of regulatory authorities.
In fact, EU data protection authorities have asked Google to ‘pause’ implementation of changes to its privacy policies(Update: which Google has declined. see more details below), until the implications of the changes become clear. And the concerns raised by various authorities aren’t baseless.
Google has in fact been in the possession of exorbitant amount of user data at this point. Even a gmail conversation, which is totally a personal and confidential data for any gmail user, is used by Google to serve targeted ads to that user.
For the same reason, Microsoft is leaving no stone unturned in reporting to the end users about how much of their data is exposed to Google via various free services that Google provides.
They plastered tons of ads on major newspapers in United States this past week, alerting the users about the intrusion in user privacy, countesy Google services.
They also posted the video of Gmail Man, a portrayal of how your data is used to target ads according to you and make Google more money.
It is yet to be seen how end users may react to the whole ‘user privacy’ controversy as going by the early experiences, users are way too inclined to set of services offered by Google that they may not really care about privacy invasion that much.
UPDATE: As per latest update, Google has declined to honor EU Data protection authority’s request to delay implementation of changes to its privacy policies. Here’s Google’s reply in its entirety.
