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Where does Google actually say that they won’t read Gmail or Google Docs?

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Re: Where does Google actually say that they won’t read Gmail or Google Docs?

#41

Post by nopal »

sixtofour wrote: post #31

From the comments: > here’s a strange little story that happened to me a while ago – I set up a gmail account to deal with nigerian letters and such (I wanted to collect some data to report the spammers/thieves, without compromising my actual e-mail address in the process). I set this up with a fake username (something like george.thompson or so) and a password which included the word “nigeria” in it. Lo and behold,…

Could he have visited any Nigeria-related sites or performed any Nigeria-related searches?

He'd have to have a sterile browsing environment to ensure his ads weren't related to something else on Google's ad network.

Re: Where does Google actually say that they won’t read Gmail or Google Docs?

#42

Post by alastair »

sixtofour wrote: post #31

From the comments: > here’s a strange little story that happened to me a while ago – I set up a gmail account to deal with nigerian letters and such (I wanted to collect some data to report the spammers/thieves, without compromising my actual e-mail address in the process). I set this up with a fake username (something like george.thompson or so) and a password which included the word “nigeria” in it. Lo and behold,…

More likely he was doing a bunch of searches about Nigerian Scams etc before/durig sign up and they matched it that way.

Re: Where does Google actually say that they won’t read Gmail or Google Docs?

#43

Post by jemfinch »

byoung2 wrote: post #18
jaysonelliot wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the FBI comes knocking on Google's door and says they have a terrorist under surveillance, and they need to read his email in order to save a busload of schoolchildren from a bomb, should Google let them do it? Is it evil to read a bad person's email, or is it evil not to read it? That's why a clearly stated policy that says exactly when Google will or will not let a human look at your documents and email is impor…

If the FBI comes knocking on Google's door and says they have a terrorist under surveillance, and they need to read his email in order to save a busload of schoolchildren from a bomb, should Google let them do it? From the Policy: [When] We have a good faith belief that access, use, preservation or disclosure of such information is reasonably necessary to (a) satisfy any applicable law, regulation, legal process or e…

A very real threat of termination: http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2369188,00.asp

Re: Where does Google actually say that they won’t read Gmail or Google Docs?

#44

Post by rwolf »

curiouskat wrote: post #36
bad_user wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The thing people don't realize is that when contacted by a big company for a job, usually it's a bot that just sent hundreds of emails. Receiving an email from Google or Facebook is nothing special.

What data sources does Facebook use to trigger the email? And are emails manually approved before they go out? If so, does that mean a Facebook employee looks at the data source that triggered email, which in some cases may be the user's private messages?

It seems to be a large leap to go from "sends lots of emails" to "automates finding people to recruit." There is a similar leap from "automates finding people to recruit" to "uses private messages as signal."

Re: Where does Google actually say that they won’t read Gmail or Google Docs?

#45

Post by jcdreads »

angdis wrote: post #24

The real question is not whether google, dropbox or anyone else has explicit "policies" about reading content from users. They're just going to say whatever makes them look good from a marketing and legal perspective. Companies lie all the time, systematically and comprehensively. They act in their own self-interest period. From their point of view it is merely a question of how much they can get away with. The more…

Even if you trust a company not to do you harm with the information they store, there exist entities that can compel them to turn this information over. For example, the information can be (sometimes secretly) subpoenaed by the U.S. government.

The choice between being evil and not being evil can be an easier one to make, practically speaking, than the choice between being evil and becoming the target of federal criminal prosecution.

Re: Where does Google actually say that they won’t read Gmail or Google Docs?

#46

Post by necro »

angdis wrote: post #24

The real question is not whether google, dropbox or anyone else has explicit "policies" about reading content from users. They're just going to say whatever makes them look good from a marketing and legal perspective. Companies lie all the time, systematically and comprehensively. They act in their own self-interest period. From their point of view it is merely a question of how much they can get away with. The more…

Speaking of trusting google... there was a situation at a company I worked at where the management strongly was against transferring the company mail system to google apps/mail because of the concern of google may read their email. They wanted to keep their internal mail infrastructure for privacy reasons of the company.

The cto at the time convinced them that there is really no point of keeping things inhouse since the majority of the management, for convenience, forwarded all their company email to their personal gmail account anyways. Funny how security is not about what you think but what you do.

Re: Where does Google actually say that they won’t read Gmail or Google Docs?

#47

Post by herbivore »

angdis wrote: post #24

The real question is not whether google, dropbox or anyone else has explicit "policies" about reading content from users. They're just going to say whatever makes them look good from a marketing and legal perspective. Companies lie all the time, systematically and comprehensively. They act in their own self-interest period. From their point of view it is merely a question of how much they can get away with. The more…

Imagine you're a startup and use gmail or Google Apps for your team communications, even customer service. One day Google decides it wants to acquire you. During negotiations, it has access to all email exchanges between you and your customers and, more importantly, you and your investors / team members. So there's definitely something "in it" for them to do so.

Re: Where does Google actually say that they won’t read Gmail or Google Docs?

#48

Post by dspeyer »

ap22213 wrote: post #29

How many individuals at google have the ability to read a particular person's personal data? If I'm a moderately important person[1], how many individuals, in or outside of google, will have access to any of that data over the life of it? And, how does google internally police against misuse? And, who watches the watchman? [1] say, 1 in a thousand, of which google has 260,000 such gmail users

Probably about 50 altogether. Each of us promises to never ever look at personal data, before being granted privileges. And I'm pretty sure all those promises are serious.

I don't know how enforcement works, though a single offense would be firing-worthy.

Re: Where does Google actually say that they won’t read Gmail or Google Docs?

#49

Post by dspeyer »

jaysonelliot wrote: post #9
byoung2 wrote: post #3

This should be covered by the statement "don't be evil"

If the FBI comes knocking on Google's door and says they have a terrorist under surveillance, and they need to read his email in order to save a busload of schoolchildren from a bomb, should Google let them do it? Is it evil to read a bad person's email, or is it evil not to read it? That's why a clearly stated policy that says exactly when Google will or will not let a human look at your documents and email is impor…

Every such request gets individually checked over by the lawyers. Many get pushed back on.

http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/governmentrequests/...

Re: Where does Google actually say that they won’t read Gmail or Google Docs?

#50

Post by chc »

herbivore wrote: post #47
angdis wrote: post #24

The real question is not whether google, dropbox or anyone else has explicit "policies" about reading content from users. They're just going to say whatever makes them look good from a marketing and legal perspective. Companies lie all the time, systematically and comprehensively. They act in their own self-interest period. From their point of view it is merely a question of how much they can get away with. The more…

Imagine you're a startup and use gmail or Google Apps for your team communications, even customer service. One day Google decides it wants to acquire you. During negotiations, it has access to all email exchanges between you and your customers and, more importantly, you and your investors / team members. So there's definitely something "in it" for them to do so.

If you had strong evidence that Google was spying on you (especially for such anti-competitive reasons), you'd have them over a barrel a lot more than vice-versa.
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