Google Concedes That Drive-by Prying Violated Privacy
Google acknowledged on Tuesday that it had violated people’s privacy during its Street View mapping project when it casually scooped up passwords, e-mails and other personal information from unsuspecting computer users, David Streitfeld reports in The New York Times.
In agreeing to settle a case brought by 38 states involving the project, the search company for the first time is required to aggressively police its own employees on privacy issues and to explicitly instruct the public about how to fend off privacy violations like this one.
While the settlement also included a tiny — for Google — fine of $7 million, privacy advocates and Google critics characterized the overall agreement as a breakthrough for a company they say has become a serial violator of privacy, with multiple enforcement actions in recent years and a slew of worldwide investigations into the way the mapping project also collected the personal data of private computer users.
More: Daily Report: Google Concedes That Drive-by Prying Violated Privacy