Google Tweaks Buzz To Tackle Privacy Concerns 153
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timothy
from the who's-zooming-who dept.
from the who's-zooming-who dept.
CWmike writes "Just two days after launching its Buzz social networking tools, Google said Thursday night that it had tweaked the technology to address early privacy concerns. Google said in a blog post that the quick updates makes it easier for users to block access to their pages and eases the path to finding two privacy features. 'We've had plenty of feature requests, and some direct feedback,' wrote Todd Jackson, a product manager for Gmail and Google Buzz, in the blog post. 'In particular there's been concern from some people who thought their contacts were being made public without their knowledge (in particular the lists of people they follow, and the people following them). In addition, others felt they had too little control over who could follow them and were upset that they lacked the ability to block people who didn't yet have public profiles from following them.'"
Tutorial about privacy before activating Buzz (Score:3, Insightful)
But people are not generally patient enough to pay attention to such details when setting their google profiles and they are the ones who raise a big cry about privacy not being respected.
Re:Tutorial about privacy before activating Buzz (Score:5, Insightful)
You can opt out by choosing the "turn off Buzz" link at the bottom of your Gmail page.
People don't read. (Score:3, Insightful)
I guess this whole privacy snafu wasn't a big deal to me because I actually read their instructions.
No, the information about which settings do what weren't in 72pt type, but it's not like they were unintelligible or not there, or not presented to the user right away. But since I actually read the instructions they gave and read the dialog boxes that came up, I didn't lose any privacy I didn't want to lose (or hadn't already given up through other channels).
People just don't read. Ask any program designer. You know why so many programs have terrible help menus and help files? Because writing them is a thankless job. A fraction of a percent will actually look at the information you give them about how your program works and how to make it do what you want. If they do somehow get around to looking at the information you provide, they don't read it; they skim it for keywords and then barely read enough to try something else.
So, yes, Google could have made it more clear what was happening when you set up Buzz, but it's not like they yanked your pants down when you weren't looking.
Re:People don't read. (Score:3, Insightful)
Read the "fuck you google" blog post. If you said *no* to buzz, it could get set up in a harmful way, which you couldn't configure or change because you had it disabled.
It still comes down to reading instructions. Even if it means reading instructions in other programs too. I meant it when I said "or hadn't already given up through other channels". Buzz doesn't magically make visible anything that you didn't already have visible. If you had your Reader shared items set to private, they stay that way, but if you had them set to public, well, they're public.
Re:The real story (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:The real story (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, the fact is that this person, who is clearly non-technical, was misinterpreting what she was seeing. This is the fault of the engineers for writing a crappy UI (it's called "consensus presentation" in UI class guys) but no actual harm was done. None of her private Reader posts were delivered to her abusive ex-husband or the stalkers who email her - it just looked that way because she assumed that if its in her buzz feed then it's in theirs, cause that's the way it works on Twitter/Facebook. Actually, that's not precisely true, she also confused 'follower' and 'following' in a way that makes no sense for those other two services too.
Admit it, this is exemplary customer service. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:The real story (Score:5, Insightful)
No, it doesn't. Because it specifically deals with a case where someone does have something to hide. (Also, it doesn't make sense, since, even with the way Buzz was set up before these change, had to be manually added and prominently displayed its sharing settings. And, further, it seems to be based on faulty assumptions about what the meaning of someone being a "follower" are and what they could see, anyhow.)
Re:The real story (Score:3, Insightful)
Google is orthogonal to privacy (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:The real story (Score:5, Insightful)
Twitter is used for public communication.
E-mail, Gmail is front-end of, is used for private communication.
Why the difference is so hard to understand??
Re:The problem with Google (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:The real story (Score:3, Insightful)
It shows more eloquently than any privacy advocate ever could why privacy is so important when "you don't have anything to hide."
No, it doesn't. Because it specifically deals with a case where someone does have something to hide.
Parent comment is disingenuous. When people say "I don't have anything to hide", they mean that if you don't do anything wrong you have no need for privacy, because you would only want to hide things that are illegal or otherwise wrong. Grandparent comment is exactly correct in pointing out the error of this all-too-common reasoning.
Re:Admit it, this is exemplary customer service. (Score:4, Insightful)
They betrayed a trust that millions of people had in them by divulging private information that they were privy to. Shame on them, I say, and this is coming from someone who is normally a Google lover and early adopter of their technologies. This whole thing just left a sour taste in my mouth. There is no defense for what they did.
Re:The real story (Score:1, Insightful)
No one is claiming that her gmail was exposed to the world, just the things she publicly shared in Reader. This has nothing to do with gmail. Buzz just allowed these things to be more easily connected. She was relying on anonymity via obscurity WRT her ex.
Re:The real story (Score:1, Insightful)
If you listen to the full context of the quote, Eric believes that you should have no expectation of privacy on information you give to any search engine because of the Patriot Act.
You're suggesting that he and Google actually support the Patriot Act, which is far from true. They, and every other U.S. organization, abide by the Patriot Act, like it or not.
Re:The real story (Score:3, Insightful)
I think you fail in comprehending the meaning of the word "public".
There is a world of difference between:
a) the public profile - a static Web page that shows text that you personally put there (or allowed to be put there.)
b) the privilege of seeing contacts and comments made by that person, now and forever.
For example, all I know about daveime from your public profile on /. is what comments you made here. Imagine if suddenly I get access to your email contacts and, through search or social engineering find out who you really are? You have your real email hidden for a perfectly good reason.
Re:The real story (Score:3, Insightful)
Bah. Google's launch of Buzz broke nothing. It was your choice to try Buzz. When entering Gmail and given a choice, you clicked the "opt-in" button instead of the "opt-out" button. Followers weren't added until after you clicked the button. Did you read all the available, Google-provided information about what would happen when you opted in, or did you just say, "Oh neat! A new toy!"
You could have continued to use Gmail just as you were, with no changes and no Buzz.
Take some responsibility for your own actions and lack of investigation.