Saturday, 17 April, 2004

There's been alot of talk in the press of about Gmail (Google's new webmail system) and the privacy concerns related to it.

The issue is this. Google want to place adverts in your e-mail depending on it's content. In essence, it'd scan your e-mail's content for key words and produce an advert suited to the content of that message.

I think this article by Tim O'Reilly really hits the issue on it's head. Google is a company and like any company it has to turn a profit. Before you condemn google for 1984 like activity.

I think it's prudent to ask yourself the question: "Is google advertising in your e-mail any more of a privacy violation than having a spam filter scan your mail?

Simon.

12:04:49 GMT | #Randomness | Permalink
XML View Previous Posts