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Google Suppresses Memo Revealing Plans to Closely Track Search Users in China

theintercept.com

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Re: Google Suppresses Memo Revealing Plans to Closely Track Search Users in China

#61

Post by jaclaz »

Aethers wrote: post #11
jaclaz wrote: post #10

>Emails demanding deletion of the memo contained “pixel trackers” that notified human resource managers when their messages had been read, recipients determined. This seems like the worst part (not that the rest is not bad), anyone has an idea of what this "pixel trackers" are and how they actually work?

It's a small transparent pixel loaded from a website (assuming the email client loads HTML). I'd make a unique image called mywebsite.com/jaclaz_read.png and when that image was loaded I'd know you read my email.

I see, never knew they were called "pixel trackers".

I am particularly "old style", I know, but I tend to use not whenever possible email clients that load the html, so an old habit turns out to be also (at least partially) "safer".

Re: Google Suppresses Memo Revealing Plans to Closely Track Search Users in China

#64

Post by crunchlibrarian »

jaclaz wrote: post #61
Aethers wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a small transparent pixel loaded from a website (assuming the email client loads HTML). I'd make a unique image called mywebsite.com/jaclaz_read.png and when that image was loaded I'd know you read my email.

I see, never knew they were called "pixel trackers". I am particularly "old style", I know, but I tend to use not whenever possible email clients that load the html, so an old habit turns out to be also (at least partially) "safer".

In large companies like this you rarely get a choice for which email client you are allowed to use, or a say in which software you are allowed to install.

Re: Google Suppresses Memo Revealing Plans to Closely Track Search Users in China

#65

Post by imhelpingu »

That would be really horrible, living in a country where Google functions as a quasi-government entity consolidating everyone's access to useful resources on the WAN and tracking users, on some secret police's behalf, under the guise of marketing.

Who can even imagine such a thing.

Re: Google Suppresses Memo Revealing Plans to Closely Track Search Users in China

#66

Post by tomlu »

kbenson wrote: post #53
tomlu wrote: post #43

Disclaimer: I work for Google. I also think that there is an anti-Google bias on hacker news, holding Google to a standard not applied to others and taking any excuse to roll out the same old tired rants in response to almost any Google post (DAE Google Reader etc). If what I read is true then this is the first thing that has truly rocked my confidence that the company generally tries to do the right thing (while mak…

So, here's an honest question: How do they find people to work on these products if the general consensus is that this is a bad thing to do? How do they keep word of these projects from spreading within the company? It seems if enough people feel strongly about this, then at least one would quit after being assigned to this project, and even if there's an NDA and they can't relate the details of why they quit, it wou…

The suggestion from the link is that some people involved didn't fully understand what they were working on. And obviously they weren't able to keep word spreading in this case.

But obviously a number of people must have known. I don't know how they approach and recruit these people, it's above my paygrade.

Re: Google Suppresses Memo Revealing Plans to Closely Track Search Users in China

#67

Post by tomlu »

Multicomp wrote: post #49
tomlu wrote: post #43

Disclaimer: I work for Google. I also think that there is an anti-Google bias on hacker news, holding Google to a standard not applied to others and taking any excuse to roll out the same old tired rants in response to almost any Google post (DAE Google Reader etc). If what I read is true then this is the first thing that has truly rocked my confidence that the company generally tries to do the right thing (while mak…

While I cannot speak for user comments after this one, nobody is referencing Google Reader here. The stakes are higher here than general "Google ain't what they was back in the Good Old Days", they are "People could be detained, tortured, (please just be hyperbole...) killed because of searches they made that were tracked by this Google Joint Venture and handed over to a repressive government".

But that's kind of my point. This is substantively different and is pretty serious. And no, I haven't seen any particularly unreasonable comments in this thread.

Re: Google Suppresses Memo Revealing Plans to Closely Track Search Users in China

#68

Post by nradov »

devoply wrote: post #36
wrs wrote: post #21

Ouch. It must be really fun for Googlers to hear their company is working so hard to repress dissidents trying to reveal its secret project to help China repress dissidents.

Fact of the matter is that there is a Chinese internet and a US internet. Going forward there will be a Chinese internet, that some authoritarian countries will adopt that are a part of the Chinese sphere of influence. American companies, and the American government through them want a foothold on that internet. This is the only way for them to do so. https://www.cnbc.com/2018/09/20/eric-schmidt-ex-google-ceo-p...

Are you certain that's the only way for them to do so? I suspect that smart people could find effective technical means to undermine and circumvent the Great Firewall of China.

Re: Google Suppresses Memo Revealing Plans to Closely Track Search Users in China

#69

Post by oh-kumudo »

Havoc wrote: post #31

This whole thing feels like it's going to hit Google straight in the face like a ton of bricks. At a minimum there is some serious streisand effect potential.

I don't think so. Half of US's electorate already see Google as hypocrite. Only ones will be truly annoyed is a certain fraction of its own employees.

Re: Google Suppresses Memo Revealing Plans to Closely Track Search Users in China

#70

Post by lph »

devoply wrote: post #36
wrs wrote: post #21

Ouch. It must be really fun for Googlers to hear their company is working so hard to repress dissidents trying to reveal its secret project to help China repress dissidents.

Fact of the matter is that there is a Chinese internet and a US internet. Going forward there will be a Chinese internet, that some authoritarian countries will adopt that are a part of the Chinese sphere of influence. American companies, and the American government through them want a foothold on that internet. This is the only way for them to do so. https://www.cnbc.com/2018/09/20/eric-schmidt-ex-google-ceo-p...

The idea that this appeasement will make Google a contender in China is blazingly ignorant of Chinese politics. No foreign company will ever be allowed to gain significant market share; it would be seen as a national security threat. The only way for Google would be to forge an equal partnership with a Chinese tech giant---Tencent, Alibaba, Huawei, or maybe one of the two dominant cell carriers.

Google is selling out for nothing.

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