Google to Pay $17 Million to Settle Privacy Case

[DamianTV]

http://tech.slashdot.org/story/13/11/19/0125220/google-to-pay-17-million-to-settle-privacy-case

"The New York Times reports, 'Google agreed on Monday to pay $17 million to 37 states and the District of Columbia ... The case involved Google's bypassing of privacy settings in Apple's Safari browser to use cookies to track users and show them advertisements in 2011 and 2012. Google has said it discontinued circumventing the settings early last year, after the practice was publicly reported, and stopped tracking Safari users and showing them personalized ads. ... the case is one of a growing pile of government investigations, lawsuits and punishments related to privacy matters at the company. They include cases involving a social networking tool called Buzz, illegal data collection by Street View vehicles and accusations of wiretapping to show personalized ads in Gmail. '"

Does not even qualify as a 'slap on the wrist' to a Super Power like Google, who has more money than some entire Countries. Oh yeah, this was one of the few times they actually got busted. How many more times did they do the same damn thing and were not caught with their hands in the Privacy Cookie Jar?

 

[specsaregood]

to pay $17 million to 37 states and the District of Columbia

Great, they pay 17million to the states, who will turn around and spend that money invading the privacy and violating rights on their own.

 

[Natural Citizen]

You post some really good stuff, DamianTV. Relevant things that pertain to the larger meme. Some advice, respectfully, would be to maybe place these things in the relevant and existing threads. Specifically the science and tech sub forum since a lot of what you share already has a relevant thread in one place or another with specific information conforming to timeline.

 

[One Man Wolf Pack]

"The case involved Google's bypassing of privacy settings in Apple's Safari browser to use cookies to track users and show them advertisements in 2011 and 2012"

Not sure they are really bypassing it... more likely abusing it: My Apple iPhone openly tracks my usage to show me advertisements and things of interest around my location.... it gives you the option to turn it off... just means you dont see it... theyre still tracking you.

 

[DamianTV]

You post some really good stuff, DamianTV. Relevant things that pertain to the larger meme. Some advice, respectfully, would be to maybe place these things in the relevant and existing threads. Specifically the science and tech sub forum since a lot of what you share already has a relevant thread in one place or another with specific information conforming to timeline.

I was thinking that before I posted, but decided to post it here because Privacy is a Political issue and Technology is the Enabler of Political Abuse. So posting here over the Tech forum, it is intended to be more Political than Technical. I think that for threads that talk specifically about how to deal with Technology stuff, like Block Cookies or Evade Tracking or troubleshoot a VPN and FTP working together, that definitely belongs better in the Tech thread as opposed to General Politics.

I try to be careful about posting in relevant forums, but if I go off forum focus, I try to explain. Health is a good example. A story like "Vitamin D helps prevent Osteoperosis", it goes in Health forum, but "Govt outlaws Vitamin D", I'll post in General Politics as that is more political than health. Same thing goes with the Tech, but I do try to make sure or at least shift focus for maintaining relevance to the proper sub forums.