Congratulations to Google saying no to DOJ subpoena
see "Google refuses to give up data" (Washington Times, 1/20/06)
http://washingtontimes.com/business/20060119-105801-2649r.htm
Congratulations to Google for refusing to comply with a Justice Department subpoena for a "random sample" of a million web addresses and search strings from one week of Google usage.
Yahoo, Microsoft, and AOL all seem to have complied to some degree with similar subpoenas, violating one of the best things about the internet: the privacy and anonymity it allows users.
The Justice Department is demanding the data as an end-run around the Child Online Protection Act, which the Supreme Court threw out two years ago on free-speech grounds.
If the government wanted to do a test of filtering technology, they can do it from their own offices. I'm sure there's more than one government employee who would be happy to research how internet porn is returned in web search results.
In the long run, for those internet users who are paying attention I would expect this to make doing business with or through Google to be that much more appealing than through other search engines and internet advertising firms.
In the short run, the news was the catalyst for a nearly 20% drop in GOOG's stock price in two days, including Fridays drop of over 36 points, GOOG's largest one-day drop ever.
So, even though the stock move cost me some money, I still offer Google congratulations and thanks.
| Print article | This entry was posted by Rossputin on 01/23/06 at 03:54:13 am . Follow any responses to this post through RSS 2.0. |
Yours truly
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01/24/06 @ 03:36:09 am
I agree that the refusal to turn over personal information by Google is a good sign of the companies commitment to its users and to advertisers.
I am not sure most Americans really even caught the news. Unless you follow the markets chances are that you didn't.
In fact, until the news hit of Google refusing to comform I had not even heard of Yahoo and AOL turning over data on its users. The official "line" is that it is information that couldnt be used to narrow out specific users, but what sort of slippery slope is this?
What would happen if in that data mining they discoverd some searches on child porn users, or unusual searches looking for bomb instructions or something similar?
Should they be allowed to then come back and ask for additional information to find out who is trying to obtain this information? Tough question... for me the answer would be yes, but the point is, they should never had gotten the first set of information.
It's good for Google to stand up to protect us, in the ever increasing world of online usage, and the importance the internet has on our society privacy is a key to our way of life.
Perhaps this is in preparation to the anticipated Google Pack which is supposed to challenge Microsoft's operating system dominance by offering users a web based alternative.
Let's hope Google sticks to its guns and helps keep their ever growing user base safe from government intervention. We are moving closer and closer to facism and this is one important step to preventing that transformation.
Sorry to hear that this action caused you to lose a little money on the stock. I had some investments in the company too, but luckily I had some hedged option spreads and came out ok.
Thats a scary stock to own just straight up stock in my friend!
take care,
michael