Protecting Your Online Privacy after Google's Massive Shift

3/8/2012 12:54:07 PM Link 0 comments | Add comment

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It would be hard to not know about Google's massive shift in approach to privacy, reflected in its March 1, 2012, launch of a single privacy policy allowing its scores of products, from gMail to YouTube to Google+, to share users' personally identifiable information across products. You can read the new privacy policy here. Google's new approach to privacy is being questioned and criticized by many. First up are concerns regarding the extent to, and ease with, which users can opt out of the "cross-pollenization," or sharing across products, of personal information. Also on the table is the question of whether these changes breach an earlier agreement between Google and the Federal Trade Commission that requires Google to obtain user consent before using information under the terms of one policy if it was gathered under a different policy. A lawsuit filed by the Electronic Privacy Information Center asking that the FTC be forced to block implementation of the new privacy policy, however, was dismissed by the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, which held that the FTC had discretion as to enforcement of its Consent Orders. In the meantime, attorneys general of 36 of our 50 states have written a letter to Google CEO Larry Page vehemently expressing their concerns with the new policy. In addition, the European Union Justice Commissioner has alleged that the new privacy policy violates EU privacy and data protection laws, which are more stringent than U.S. law.

So what is an Internet user to do, when it seems, practically speaking, impossible to use the Internet without running into some Google product? Here are some practical, simple steps you can take to protect your online privacy post-Google-privacy-policy change:
http://www.pcadvisor.co.uk/news/security/3343210/4-tips-control-your-google-privacy/