Concerns over Google’s Privacy Policy Changing on March 1, 2012
Jennifer Stoddart, Privacy Commissioner of Canada, addressed a letter on February 23, 2012 to Colin MacKay, Manager of Global Public Policy at Google, in order to request additional information from Google over its plans to streamline its privacy policy on March 1, 2012 to one general policy from over 70 distinct ones. Ms. Stoddart acknowledged Google’s attempt to streamline its privacy policy but expressed concern over a lack of specific information related to data retention and disposal in its new consolidated policy.
The Privacy Commissioner’s concern was directed towards the impact on logged-in Google account holders and increased data sharing across more Google products including Google Search and YouTube. In the case of Android phone users, Stoddart expressed concern that those users would be limited in what they could do without signing into Google, such as making phone calls and sending text messages. Downloading or updating applications won’t be possible on an Android phone without signing into Google, nor will the ability to synchronize an Android phone with Gmail or Google Calendar. Google will retain several product-related policies such as Google Wallet that enables Android users to tap their phones and pay for products in stores.
Various media sources have been offering tips to Google users on removing search history, clearing one’s YouTube history, making Gmail Chat “off-the-record”, checking the dashboard, opting out of personalized advertisements on the Ads Preferences page, using Google Takeout for data liberation of selected information, and so on. Some Google users might choose to terminate their Google account by visiting the Google account settings page.
France’s Commission Nationale de l'Informatique et des Libertés (CNIL) will be launching an investigation into Google’s privacy policy with the interim view that Google’s policy would not conform to European laws that protect the privacy of individuals. Google announced that it would continue with the policy change as it has informed over 350 million authenticated (logged-in) users, has provided notifications on its home page, and has informed non-authenticated (not logged in) users through their search results.
(See also: Changes to Google’s Privacy Policy Attract Attention )
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