Microsoft slams Google's privacy policy in newspaper ad

Discussion in 'other software & services' started by guest, Feb 1, 2012.

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  1. guest

    guest Guest

  2. Hungry Man

    Hungry Man Registered Member

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    My point is that TRUSTe doesn't mean anything... at all. Anyone who complies with their own policy can self-sign. Their new policy gives them as much power as MS's... they can both cross reference collected data. It's the same level of data collection as always...

    Google has an extension/ cookie opt out. That's it.

    If you think that makes them evil by all means feel free to think that.
     
  3. guest

    guest Guest

    About who is "evil"... Just found an interesting wall of text, haha.

     
  4. Hungry Man

    Hungry Man Registered Member

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    Well that settles it. Google is evil!
     
  5. guest

    guest Guest

    Questions are,

    Why didn't Google earn a TRUSTe seal?

    Wasn't Google complying with its own privacy policies?

    Are the stories about Google employers being fired because of "accessing peoples' data" true or false?

    Data collected by Microsoft = non-human accessible
    Data collected by Google = human readable

    True or false? :argh:

    BTW, I'm not willing to read all those walls of text made by Google with different links to different pages containing more and more walls of text. rofl
     
  6. Hungry Man

    Hungry Man Registered Member

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    Maybe this is where you're confused? You don't earn it. You give it to yourself. It's a pat on the back saying "I'll keep on being me."

    I don't believe GMail allows local encryption for emails so true.

    It's a pain I suppose but uh... just don't use GMail? lol It's not like Google's hiding the fact.

    If you want to think that makes them evil that's fine.

    EDIT: http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/gmail?hl=en

    You should ask them to allow it. I doubt they'd respond though.
     
  7. guest

    guest Guest

    Not true according to this: http://www.truste.com/about_TRUSTe/faqs

    Again:
    Data collected by Microsoft = non-human accessible
    Data collected by Google = human readable

    If that is really true: when using Google services you have to give away much more "trustfulness" than when using Microsoft services. Period.
     
  8. Hungry Man

    Hungry Man Registered Member

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    Basically you send them ypur policy and some money and voila. Google's lack of "TRUST"e isn't really making me gasp.

    If you think that Google hasn't applied for TRUSTe because they know they wouldn't "get in"... IDK what to tell you lol

    No... data collected from both is entirely readable... you're confusing emails with data. If you choose to encrypt your MS emails it's not like your search data is suddenly encrypted lol it's just as legible as always.

    The emails kept on MS's servers are encrypted.
    The emails kept on Google's are not encrypted.

    The data kept by MS is not encrypted (why would they bother using it?)
    The data kept by Google is not encrypted.

    You can opt out/ keep track of tracking by MS.
    You can opt out/ keep track of tracking by Google.

    The only difference is that GMail doesn't encrypt your emails... that's it.

    So, to reiterate, data =/= emails.
     
  9. Hungry Man

    Hungry Man Registered Member

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    Let me put it this way... if I cared about data tracking I'd have just as many tools using Google or Microsoft.

    If I cared about employees reading my emails I'd go with Microsoft.
     
  10. guest

    guest Guest

    But that is what is needed to begin the review and approval process, according to their FAQ.

    Dunno but I can't rule out that possibility.

    Oh. I meant data "possible of being" collected "by bad employers of", sorry.
     
  11. Hungry Man

    Hungry Man Registered Member

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    I don't think there's anything special about TRUSTe... if you want to look further into that post about it when you find something. I personally don't care that a company doesn't have some random cert from a random company that basically says "Follow your own rules." That discussion is beyond me I think.

    Ok.
     
  12. guest

    guest Guest

  13. Hungry Man

    Hungry Man Registered Member

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    Not much. They pretty much just stated what's happened. They don't really seem to even take a side, if anything they commend Google a few times for transparency...

    http://www.benedelman.org/news/092506-1.html

    TRUSTe has also had hundreds of privacy policy infringements that violate their certificate and in no case have they brought their enforcement against the companies.

    Really, this just isn't tipping the scale in MS's favor at all in my opinion... I can't really take it very seriously.
     
  14. guest

    guest Guest

  15. Hungry Man

    Hungry Man Registered Member

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    Good to know. Not that I care lol I don't really consider TRUSTe relevant...
     
  16. guest

    guest Guest

    Well, I can tell you one thing:

    I tried Microsoft and Google privacy controls over the last hour (while typing here and playing a Chess game against a rl friend, lol) and double checked Facebook's ones (which I already knew well, because I have a Facebook account and I tweaked everything on it some months ago).

    Both Microsoft's and Facebook's privacy controls are powerful and very simple to use. One just needs to want to use them. Google's privacy controls however, are very complicated. To complete my objective (disable targeted advertising) on Google, I had to deal with more text walls, more buttons, more links - way more complications.

    We know that both Facebook and Microsoft got seals from TRUSTe. And we know that Google doesn't have a TRUSTe seal - for some unknown reason(s).

    So, TRUSTe may be making a difference on those privacy controls offered by Microsoft and Facebook. At least, that's what my experience is telling me.
     
  17. Hungry Man

    Hungry Man Registered Member

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    I don't think so... but I suppose we'll just have to disagree there.
     
  18. m00nbl00d

    m00nbl00d Registered Member

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    Whether or not Google is all about evilness, Microsoft isn't all peachy either. :ninja:

    Tracking Protection Lists, Internet Explorer's 9 amazing privacy feature.

    Do the following. Make sure you clean your browser session. Block ALL cookies in IE9; then add TPLs. If one of those TPLs happen to be allowing a third-party connection, due to the website malfunctioning otherwise, you'll notice that cookies will be allowed for that domain, even though you're blocking ALL cookies.

    I noticed this behavior sometime ago (a few months back) in a relative's system, while making a research. My relative was using IE9 back then.

    I don't know if it was some "bug" in IE9 or what, and whether or not it has been "solved", but you're free to test on your own and see if it happens.
     
  19. elapsed

    elapsed Registered Member

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    No idea. This is why I stick to and recommend Fanboy's lists to everyone.
     
  20. vasa1

    vasa1 Registered Member

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    Source
     
  21. NGRhodes

    NGRhodes Registered Member

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    Who owns and has access to the encryption keys though ?

    Microsoft can and have done (as with Google as well) in the past read users emails under court order, which implies they have the ability to decrypt users emails.

    Cheers, Nick
     
    Last edited: Feb 4, 2012
  22. Hungry Man

    Hungry Man Registered Member

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    You can locally encrypt your mail I assume otherwise encryption is useless. From what I understood there are two layers of encryption, 1 being the RSA (symmetric) where they hold the key and then the local asymmetric key, which the user can opt to use.

    Hopefully I didn't just confuse symmetric and asymmetric crypto or I'll feel very silly. The point is, regardless, that (from what I understood) at some point the user can encrypt it on their own.

    If they can't then it really doesn't help a ton.
     
  23. Hungry Man

    Hungry Man Registered Member

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    This is hardly the first smear campaign by Microsoft let alone the first one on Google. Facebook's tried to scare people before about Google's privacy as well.
     
  24. m00nbl00d

    m00nbl00d Registered Member

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    Wait a moment... wait a moment... :D We can encrypt e-mails in Hotmail? Where's the damn option? :argh:
     
  25. J_L

    J_L Registered Member

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    Maybe use encrypted attachments as the true message? Or some kind of code?

    This local asymmetric key sounds useful though.
     
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