Another Google "abuse prevention gone wrong" horror story | Hacker News Reader

Another Google "abuse prevention gone wrong" horror story

twitlonger.com

21 pointsmcantor16 comments

This guy has been creating a lot of noise on Google+ in the past day. Although I have no direct information, the early signs are that Google is comfortable about why they terminated his account.

In general I don't care about this guy. More interesting is the issue of "my data" and "your service." I see this as equivalent to a landlord and a tenant (no matter how little rent paid). The landlord can, under certain circumstances, kick the tenant out. The landlord cannot under, any circumstances, hold or destroy the tenant's possessions.

Longer post here https://plus.google.com/115878613002809583306/posts/WsWj4CEh...

What's the digital equivalent of leaving all your crap on the front porch?

Nice one! :)

Pastebin or mailinator.com I guess :)

I can see it now, datafrontporch.com, an escrow service for data. Sign up now for protection when, not if, your account is cancelled.

The cost of storing that data for 60 days after the account is terminated would be minor.

This link was posted here yesterday. Matt Cutts' comment: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2795465

Suffice it to say that many Google employees have looked into this, including me. After digging into the situation, I agree with the action that Google took in this case.

I also went and got Google's official comment: "For the privacy of those involved, we don't discuss motivations behind account suspensions but we are confident in our actions in this case."

I'm sorry that I can't go into more detail.

Your responses remind me of disturbing passages from Kafka's The Trial. There is no need to discuss specifics in public, but why not let the Accused know the violation they've committed? Why is there no appeals process where the Accused can respond to specific allegations? And why not let the Accused download their data?

I'm sure your response seems reasonable to you, since you are familiar with the details, but try to understand what it looks like from the outside. Personally, once the Apple cloud is up I'm moving all my important data away of Google.

I know that from the outside that it probably looks like Google has been unfair or uncaring in this case. I'm sorry that I can't go into the details.

Now I can: http://www.twitlonger.com/show/bvqdos

Ah man, child pornography, once again the edge case that screws up reasonable planning. Can't explain, for fear that if the user wasn't really guilty, you're taking a pretty serious step in accusing them of peddling child pornography. And also can't give them their data, for fear that if they were guilty, you're redistributing child pornography.

The only thing that might be nice, besides some personalized review of hard edge cases, is to allow users to export "untainted" data, if it can somehow be isolated. E.g. if one gallery was flagged, still let him export his uncontroversial email archives.

I think it would ameliorate a lot of the fear, uncertainty and doubt around this situation if Google could answer the following question: Does the user in question currently have the ability to extract the data he had in Google services, and if not, will Google provide him with his data?

If there's no way to answer that question without compromising his privacy, can Google at least share its policy on data liberation in situations such as this, and publicize it broadly via the Data Liberation Front?

Right, and this is what has caused millions of people to panic today and realize that Google really can't be trusted with our data. If someone hacks you and does something with your account, or even if you just do something stupid, years of data is just gone like that with no explanation. Now to me Google is just as unreliable as keeping all my data on a single hard drive with no backup.

Here's the resolution: http://www.twitlonger.com/show/bvqdos That explains why providing the data back to the user was a delicate issue.

The response this time is striking different from a case[1] just a few days ago. Is this standard Google policy or did she just not talk to pr/the lawyers?

[1] http://www.reddit.com/r/google/comments/it8ah/when_google_de...

Quit using the privacy BS excuse. THE USER IN QUESTION HAS NO CLUE WHY HIS ACCOUNT WAS CLOSED. TELL HIM.

What the fuck Matt, at least tell HIM what he supposedly did! WHAT THE FUUUUCK???

Does Google's support system suck? Yes.

But these posts from people annoy me, because they really don't add anything to the debate at all.

I did not violate any Terms of Service

Maybe correct, maybe a lie, or maybe he just doesn't realise he did. We have no way of knowing which.

your refusal to provide me with any proof otherwise makes me absolutely certain of this

If you weren't certain of this before they didn't provide proof, apparently you're not too familiar with their ToS, maybe the original statement that you did nothing wrong wasn't quite as definite as it sounded.

I should also mention that I am in fact a paying customer in so much as I purchased my domain through Google and I have purchased additional storage from Google.

What relevance is that to their shutting down other services?

I have been what you could call an enthusiastic supporter of Google as a company

Who cares? And frankly I would rather know that a company treats their customers equally, rather than giving better support to people who boast that they were early adopters.

I am absolutely furious that they would disable my account without notice

Perhaps he's forgotten what he wrote in the second paragraph of this long rant, which was despite your automated message telling me your system “perceived a violation.”.

Screw it, bored of reading this now. Essentially, make the point that Google support is awful, sure. But surround it by a whole load of drivel and credibility is lost.

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