EPIC Sues FTC Over Google's Planned Privacy Changes

angry tapir writes "The Electronic Privacy Information Center has filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Federal Trade Commission, asking a court to force the agency to take action against Google over planned changes in the company's collection of personal data. EPIC, in briefs filed Wednesday, asked the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia to require the FTC to enforce a 2011 privacy agreement between the agency and Google over the company's fumbled rollout of its Buzz social networking service."

Re:Slashdot is dead

[leoplan2]

Tl;dr: If you don't like this site, stop visiting it. Go and read WMPowerUser, Microsoft News, Gizmodo, Macrumors, Cult of Mac, etc. There is a lot of choice out there

Re:EPIC

[NeutronCowboy]

Ok, I don't understand. On the one hand, Google is forced to implement a comprehensive privacy program. On the other hand, EPIC complains that Google's new privacy rules are.... too comprehensive? Can someone point me to what is actually changing in the privacy terms that is actually so bad? As far as I can tell, everyone's just complaining that the policies are going to be merged. So instead of having 20 separate privacy policies, now each service is governed by the same. How is that bad?

Just wondering, cuz I seriously don't get the outrage.

Re:EPIC

[c0lo]

What on earth... why are all these trolls so angry?

Maybe it is not because Google will combine the privacy policies into a single one, but also all the users data across all its services? [macworld.com]

Perhaps the move will no longer let you share individual services data, like sharing your Google+ data but withhold your Calendar?
If so, would you still be considering trolls the guys at EPIC?

Re:EPIC

[buback]

Meanwhile: Facebook changes it's privacy policy for the 20th time since the announcement of google's policy change.

simple explanation

[dutchwhizzman]

Google did not do the EULA thing just for private single persons, but they signed actual contracts with business users. Those policies get changed as well, not to the benefit of said business users. Those business users have a much stronger case in court to object to the changes, since there is a clear contract, money at stake and all that.

The biggest underlying change, also for businesses, is that in practice Google now reserve the right to have any bit of data they get on you, no matter how, linked to all the other bits of data on you. This applies to both private and business use, or a combination of both. If you think how much google scrapes and logs, they will probably know more about you than your mother, your best friend and your girl/boyfriend combined. Imagine what could happen to your business or personal life if that data got into the hands of a company that actually knows how to mine raw data.... oh wait....

Re:So I opt out? Consider Tmo

[theshowmecanuck]

Search using Yahoo. Or Bing. Hell, Microsoft is starting to look a lot less evil than Google. Nothing forcing anyone to use Google. So I says fuck 'em. Can't believe I now wish I'd bought an iPhone instead of an android. Next time. Anyway, if people really want to send Google a message, stop using them. Maybe a mass one day general boycott, like on February 15 to protest. Everyone use yahoo or Bing on that day. Just an idea. Spread da word if you think it worth it.

Re:EPIC

[icebraining]

your real self will be exposed to Google I'm sure employers and marketing ages will be anteing up lots of money to see your real self - what websites you view, what you've searched, what kind of videos you browsed. A veritable gold mine.

Please tell me how can I as an hypothetical employer access that information about a person without her or his consent.

Google is fucking scary in how much they know about you, but lets not throw lies with it. They offer no way to access that information unless you're law enforcement. Which, again, is bad enough, but not so bad as you're claiming.

Re:EPIC

[DarwinSurvivor]

Actually yes, if the same username and password is used to log into 2 websites owned by the same company, why would you expect the information NOT to be shared?!?