Google's Super Bowl ad shows the need for search privacy | Hacker News Reader

Google's Super Bowl ad shows the need for search privacy

eff.org

33 pointstdmackey14 comments

> Microsoft's Bing is anonymizing this information after six months by deleting the entire Internet Protocol ("IP") address associated with your search queries. Google can and should anonymize search queries in the same way after six months or less.

FUD. 20 seconds of Googling shows me:

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http://www.google.com/privacy_faq.html#toc-anonymize Why are search engine logs kept before being anonymized?

We strike a reasonable balance between the competing pressures we face, such as the privacy of our users, the security of our systems and the need for innovation. We believe anonymizing IP addresses after 9 months and cookies in our search engine logs after 18 months strikes the right balance.

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http://www.bing.com/community/blogs/search/archive/2010/01/1... Specifically, we are reducing the amount of time we store IP addresses from searchers to 6 months. Currently we keep that information for 18 months before we delete it. .. Then, after 18 months we take the additional step of deleting the IP address and any other cross session IDs associated with the query.

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"Cross session IDs"? What is that? Cookies? All cookies? In my mind, these policies are very equivalent. Google already does the same thing after six months. Probably the same thing at 18. Plus, Bing just announced this change a week or two ago.

The difference is that when Google speaks of "anonymizing" your IP information, they are only removing the last octet, whereas Bing is removing it entirely. The EFF argues that this form of anonymizing doesn't go far enough, considering that (among other things) it's entirely possible that only one IP address on a given subnet is active.

http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2007/03/googles-new-plan-anonym...

That article is from 2007, while Google changed its logs policy in 2008. Does anyone know if the new policy anonymizes full IP addresses, or just the last octet?

I think the fact that Google still uses the phrase "anonymizing IP addresses" as opposed to logs or queries speaks for itself. If they spoke of anonymizing logs or queries, that could imply the possibility of deleting IPs. But to "anonymize" an IP implies something weaker than deletion, otherwise they would just use that term.

I think that's cute. Google tries to be cool in their adds and I think they succeed at that, there's something close and personal(duh!) in every one of those.

Here's a direct link there are a few more to what already posted on eff website -- http://www.youtube.com/searchstories

I apologize but I can't stand seeing a billion articles on this topic. Can anyone tell me why they care? It's not like Google is selling information to identity thieves.

Google can piece a life together? Cool! It's so big it wont know what to do with my life story; however, I'd love to see what it is (through my google searches) so far.

This sort of sums up why I care: http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2009/12/my_reaction_to...

If someone wants to produce a great bit of linkbait, make a page where you do the "Google searches done through history" for various famous people like Bush, Hitler, Churchill, Ghandi, and so on. I'd read it!

Its Gandhi not Ghandi.

It's "it's" not "its".

Oops. Nit-pick got nit-picked :-)

I am Indian and English is not my first language, it's third after my local language and official/national language Hindi.

Thanks. Will try to improve.

Thanks! I made a comment about people nitpicking over spellings on online forums, including HN, a few weeks back, and someone replied saying they'd never seen it happen here. Example duly noted :-)

Well, stumm's response to my nit-pick is a better example of that.

"...and its great that Google used this opportunity to illustrate the importance of search privacy to one of the world's largest audiences." I do not agree with this. I don't think that Google wanted to show us this, it rather is a negative side effect of this touching ad.

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