Australia Drops Second Google Investigation 63
joshgnosis writes "The Australian Privacy Commissioner has decided against investigating Google a second time over the collection of Wi-Fi payload data in Google's Street View cars. Despite a damning FCC report released last month claiming that senior manager within Google were aware that a 'rogue' engineer was working on the project on the side, he said a second investigation wouldn't yield any new results. 'I have decided not to open another investigation into Google Street View,' he said in a statement. 'In reaching this decision, I have considered the FCC's report and don't consider that a new investigation would reveal any information that would change our original finding.'"
Re:What they really meant. (Score:4, Insightful)
Or maybe:
'In reaching this decision, I have considered the lack of additional campaign contributions by Microsoft, and don't consider that a new investigation would reveal any information that would change our original finding.'"
Seriously, though, is there anyone here who really thinks this investigation deserves to go around a second time, based on the technical merits? We're talking about going around logging stuff that is being broadcast in the clear, unencrypted, and no more than a few seconds at any location. I know it's important to anti-Googlers because it's pretty much the closest the company has come so far to being evil, but it's kind of a lame complaint when you compare it to what most other tech companies are doing these days (Microsoft and Apple funding patent trolls, Facebook trying to ratchet down privacy protections, most tech companies forcing people to give up legal rights via EULA, etc). Is this seriously the worst thing that can be said about Google? If it is, they've got to be the most ethically-run company on the planet.
Re:What they really meant. (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:What they really meant. (Score:4, Informative)
They are about to go after Google for tax evasion - a few politicians were (rightly) outraged when it became public knowledge that Google only paid $74k in tax on the multiple billions which Australian people and companies paid to them for services provided in Australia.
Multiple billions?
Try about one. [delimiter.com.au]
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Ah, well that makes their tax contribution reasonable then. Thanks for the contribution.
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I'm sick of all the bloody money the Government blows on royal commissions and investigation of this sort.
They generate hugely expensive, massive documents that no one reads or really gives a damn about in the end, and are basically a way for politicians to say "hey we are doing something about it" without actually doing anything about it.
At the end of the day, who really gives a shit if your wifi connection has been tagged and a bit of data sniffed? if you care that much about it, secure it properly in th
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You miss the point altogether. Now, Google will not be prosecuted in Australia for stealing people's data. It is theft whether or not they left their wifi open.
No, it's not theft, it's copyright infringement.
It's not even that; it's failing to turn off your tape recorder when you ride past someone who's shouting into the street from his open window.
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Google only paid $74k in tax on the multiple billions which Australian people and companies paid to them for services provided in Australia.
That is a function of the tax laws. The only reliable way to generate tax revenue on services provided by a foreign company is to charge a goods and services tax on purchases of those services. If the GST was not included in those figures, they are misleading. If the GST applied and was not collected, it should have been. If the GST does not apply, perhaps the power
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"The only reliable way to generate tax revenue on services provided by a foreign company"
We're talking about revenue to and taxes paid entirely by Google Australia.
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It is unreasonable to expect to collect corporate income taxes from corporations that are not actually domiciled in the taxing entity. Legally speaking, it is essentially impossible. Tariffs and GSTs are about the only options.
Tax collection cooperation between countries to moot jurisdictional issues would be a way to handle it as well. For the remaining countries, there's always the military & intelligence departments of a large country, such as the US or Australia.
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Really? Do you have inside information on this? Do you really believe that Google made multiple billions in Australia? Do you know if they had additional expenses in Australia last year because they were expanding there? Do you know what there expenses were at all? Do you know if they got a tax offset from the government because the brought a whole bunch of new jobs there recently? Do you know what other forms of compensation Google may have offered to Australia? Do you have all this inside informati
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Why bother with an invasion of privacy case when they can go for the bigger fish? They are about to go after Google for tax evasion - a few politicians were (rightly) outraged when it became public knowledge that Google only paid $74k in tax on the multiple billions which Australian people and companies paid to them for services provided in Australia.
Just a tip, exaggeration weakens your point.
Indeed, Australia should go after Google for "managing its tax affairs in the way most advantageous to itself". And they should go after Apple and Microsoft too. After all, these "tax optimization" techniques were all pioneered by Microsoft, the other fat techs just follow the leader in that regard. Not saying it's right.
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Why bother with an invasion of privacy case when they can go for the bigger fish? .
Because invasion of privacy is *important*.
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I know it's important to anti-Googlers because it's pretty much the closest the company has come so far to being evil
Far from it. Google's "most evil" act so far I'd say was joining with Verizon to kill wireless net-neutrality. [fiercewireless.com]
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Your bar for evil is set a bit low. Getting Verizon to agree on net-neutrality on wired but not wireless is going farther towards net-neutrality than many others have. If that's evil, all of the companies which didn't get any net-neutrality agreements from a major ISP must be truly diabolical.
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Thats an extremely hopeful twist on what happened... Google didn't convince Verizon to "agree" on wired net neutrality. Google simply bent over and offered its support in exchange of Android pimping.
It is because of Google that the wireless net neutrality exceptions were accepted, because "Google had nothing to win so their agreement must mean there is no biggie" (other than Google actually having a lot to win from Verizon's Android support.)
Shame Job (Score:1)
Bit embarrassing to be a Skip when our Government panics over something so foolish and useless. 'Google has collected the shape of mailboxes on their cameras, let's investigate this horrific breach of privacy!' Our minister in charge of the digital economy at the time publicly stated he 'still doesn't know how to use his phone'.
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Google more powerful than Oz government (Score:1, Informative)
Now it's official. Australia doesn't want to take on a company with the power and reach of Google. They'll cower before Facebook as well no doubt. Wimps.
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I don't know why this got modded down. I live in Australia and it's a perfectly accurate observation. +1 informative.
Re:Google more powerful than Oz government (Score:4, Insightful)
Because GP (and you) have missed the part where they've already went after Google's wifi collection and don't think they'll get anything new from that case. Now Google's tax practices, we'll have to see...
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lol - don't even know what an astroturfer is. Nice title though.
just tax (Score:1, Funny)
while their at it, we might just see a "Windows Tax" soon, along with a "Porn Tax" and a "Slashdot Posting Tax"
The only question is why anyone investigated it? (Score:1)
I mean, what is the point? They were investigating using WIFI networks as a way of providing location services for devices without GPS, so they collected data, either in a "just slurp the lot and we'll analyse it later", or a "keep the raw data, we might find it useful" manner.
The only question is why, when they realised it contained private information, they didn't just delete it. Instead, they announced that they had inadvertently intercepted private data. Then all these government agencies started to ma
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RTFS again. There was an ethically questionable engineer at Google who was responsible for collecting and retaining the unnecessary data. If memory serves, he wanted to do statistical analysis on the passwords he was collecting. Eventually, Google fessed up to it, even though they could have just covered it up and no one would ever have known. The only possible question is why his superiors took so long to deal with the problem once they knew about it, and my guess would be that they wanted to give him a ch
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The only possible question is why his superiors took so long to deal with the problem once they knew about it.
But that is serious enough to warrant an investigation and prosecution. They didn't give a damn. People don't seem to follow that this means there will be NO prosecution for wardriving and unauthorized data mining. It beggars belief that anyone on /. doesn't get how serious that is, especially for a company in the business of profiling users.
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Wardriving illegal? (Score:2)
People don't seem to follow that this means there will be NO prosecution for wardriving and unauthorized data mining. It beggars belief that anyone on /. doesn't get how serious that is, especially for a company in the business of profiling users.
What? How could intercepting data transmitted into a public space in the clear be liable to prosecution? And how could that be 'unauthorized data mining'? I have metal in my car keys, and they intercept that data all the time. Mind you, all it does with it is convert it into a couple of microjoules of heat, but my notebook's and phone's wifi hardware goes further.
I 'get' exactly how serious it is. I have no idea why it ever became the subject for a single slashdot article.
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R.I.P. Slashdot (Score:1)
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The diligent engineer did know what he was doing and did pass on his issues up the ladder. Nothing was done.
http://digitaljournal.com/article/324002 [digitaljournal.com]
"This private data would then âoebe analyzed offline for use in other initiatives,â like researching how well Googleâ(TM)s other services are used, the document said."
http://www.dailytech.com/FCC+Google+Knowingly+Used+Street+View+Cars+to+Snoop+on+Emails+Texts/article24574.htm [dailytech.com] has more
Privacy Law can't hurt Google anyway (Score:3)
Look at these slap on the wrist penalties:
Don't get excited about the financial compensation. That is only if you have suffered economic loss and the employee who did it doesn't have to pay a cent.
http://www.caslon.com.au/privacyguide3.htm [caslon.com.au]
http://www.privacy.gov.au/complaints/outcomes [privacy.gov.au]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Privacy_in_Australian_law [wikipedia.org]
As an Australian. (Score:2)
Sorry :/ some people are fucking stupid and have no idea about technology.
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If you're stupid enough to broadcast information you don't want out there, it's your own fault.
Read L Lessig's book for "why" this can happen... (Score:2)
"Republic, Lost: How Money Corrupts Congress - and a Plan to Stop It"
(There are -also- some very good videos about of Lessig presenting its main ideas;
we heartily recommend them to all.)
Troll article (Score:2)
Despite a damning FCC report released last month claiming that senior manager within Google were aware that a 'rogue' engineer was working on the project on the side, he said a second investigation wouldn't yield any new results. [...] "In reaching this decision, I have considered the FCC's report and don't consider that a new investigation would reveal any information that would change our original finding.'"
So, despite information in the FCC report, he's not doing an investigation because it's already in the FCC's report?
Sounds to me like he said "oh, the FCC found this, I trust that they did a good job on it so I won't waste everybody's time/money"
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Tax is off-topic (Score:2)
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