Google’s European Zeitgeist event this year has been nicknamed “the Royal one” as it was attended not only by the usual business heavyweights like Vivendi’s Jean-Bernard Lévy and Richard Branson but by Prince Charles of the UK, Crown Prince Haakon of Norway and Prince Philip of Spain.

The presence of royalty is not as strange as it might initially seem. Much of Zeitgeist revolves around discussions on how to save the planet, and this is a project that many otherwise under-employed European royals have embraced.

Perhaps these aristocrats also see a kindred spirit in Google, the king of the internet. Oh if only it weren’t for those tedious elected governments, those dull regulations, how much easier it would be to make the world work better. Continue reading "Googling democracy"

For a little while it looked like things were looking up for Phorm, the internet advertising technology company. There had been a year of controversy about the company’s technology which monitors internet users web surfing behaviour at the ISP level - a technique known as “deep packet inspection”, which has raised accusations of spying with some privacy activists.

But at the beginning of the year, things went quiet.  There were a few positive statements about targeted advertising from UK officials like Stephen Carter, and the company launched a trial with KT, the Korean broadband provider.

Now, suddenly, the controversy is raging again. Continue reading "Phorm controversy sparks up again"

Responding to concerns that it was invading users’ privacy and taking ownership of their content, Facebook will let its members choose what terms of service govern the popular social networking site.

Starting today, users will have a week to vote between two sets of documents: a revised version of the terms of use released in February that incorporates user feedback and clarifies language about Facebook’s relationship to content posted on the site, or the existing terms of use that still include controversial language. Continue reading "Facebook puts terms of service up for a vote"

Privacy activists have had a busy few weeks. First there was Google’s announcement that it would start using behavioural targeting for its display advertising, which had them up in arms. The following week Google launched Street View, the controversial 3D mapping feature, in the UK, again drawing protest. The latest concern is over revelations that the UKgovernment is thinking of monitoring social networking sites like Facebook, MySpace and Bebo as part of its anti-terrorism measures.

There is already an EU directive on monitoring emails and internet usage, requiring internet service providers to store traffic data for 12 months. Since the July 2005 the UK government has been keen to broaden the scope of the ways it can monitor for terrorists. This latest proposal is to extend this to social networking sites, which have become hugely popular after the proposals were first formulated.

  Continue reading "UK government considers monitoring social networking sites"

On Twitter, some tweets are serious leaks. Take the case of Live Search.

Rumours about Microsoft’s rebranding of Live Search, the search engine it hopes will one day rival Google, have swirled in technology circles for months.

Last weekend those rumours seemed confirmed, when LiveSide.net published a screenshot from Twitter that appeared to be from an overenthusiastic Microsoft insider: “Played today with Live search upcoming (to be rebranded) launch pre-beta. I like the new features and UX so far.” (Today the rumours were confirmed by the company.) Continue reading "Indiscreet Tweets"

Facebook is always walking on eggshells when privacy is concerned. Last year it came under fire for storing user information after an account was deleted.  In 2007, it revised its Beacon service, which shared users’ activity on other sites with their Facebook friends. Now Facebook is facing allegations that it is trying to take ownership of users’ content.

The latest row occurred after the blog Consumerist called attention to minor but potentially wide-reaching changes to Facebook’s so-called terms of service (TOS), the set of rules users tacitly agree to when using the site. Continue reading "Facebook retreats after latest privacy row"

Of all the schemes Google has dreamt up over the years, Street View has got to be one of the most controversial.

For those not familiar with the idea, Google are taking photos of every street in pretty much the whole world, and integrating it with Google Maps. Naturally, several privacy groups are up in arms at the idea, even though Google have agreed to blur faces and remove people if they request it.

But blurring isn’t Google’s only problem. In what may become a test case, a couple in Pennsylvania are suing Google for publishing pictures of their house, as it is on a private road.

In a statement to court, Google said complete privacy does not exist, but have since said that their remarks have been taken out of context. Google clarified this to me in the following statement:

“There’s been some misinterpretation concerning our response to the Street View suit… It should not be interpreted as a blanket statement on our views towards privacy. To be clear, Google respects an individual’s right to privacy. We have privacy protections built into all of our products. For example, we blur faces in Street View and we offer easy-to-use removal tools so users can decide for themselves whether or not they want a given image to appear in Street View. It is unfortunate the parties involved opted to pursue litigation instead of making use of these tools.”

This problem will be far greater for Street View in the UK due to the very high number of private roads. There are around 40,000 in the UK, according to Private Roads Services. Although it’s hard to quantify the number of public roads in the UK, I estimate there are around 100,000 streets in London (according to a quick calculation counting the entries in the London street atlas).

Google said its policy was to not photograph private roads, and that its drivers were trained to look out for them. Which I think means not driving past a sign saying “private road”. But a spokesman admitted that mistakes have been made, and they would be more careful in future. “We made the error of photographing the approach road to a military base in the US,” said the spokesman. “We learnt from that.”

It has been a week of regulatory decisions on internet privacy issues.

The UK’s Office of the Information Commissioner has given the go-ahead for Phorm, the targeted advertising company to start trials with BT. While the ICO statement of this is not exactly a ringing endorsement of the service, it doesn’t raise any insurmountable concerns. Phorm is still under close scrutiny, but for now, allowed to go ahead.

At the same time, the Article 29 Working Party has finally published its opinion on data protection issues related to search engines, going much further than some observers expected. Search engines are to be required to delete search logs after only six months compared with 18 currently for Google and 13 for Microsoft and Yahoo.

There is still much puzzling over the exact interpretation of the dense document, but under some of the strictest readings it suggests that even the search terms you type into a search engine are personal information and should not be used without your permission for other purposes. In other words, they shouldn’t be used to send you targeted ads, an interpretation that would entirely undermine Google’s business model.

It seems unlikely that the rules will be taken to this extreme, but it is clear there is a clash coming between Google and the European regulators on the recommendations. Google maintains it needs server logs for 18 months – some European regulators say even 6 months are too much. After a year and a half of talking, neither side has convinced the other. It doesn’t bode well for finding a compromise from here.

The Phorm and Google cases show that regulators have fallen out of sync with public opinion on these matters. For internet users, Phorm is the easier to hate, because noone really likes advertising. Google, on the other hand, provides a useful service and is forgiven for much.

The regulators, however, appear to see Google as the more problematic of the two. It is OK to target people with ads as long as it is done anonymously, without identifying people. What is not OK is having a lot of personal details sitting on company servers, however unobtrusively they may have been collected and used.