Inside Google

Invading Our Privacy on the Internet

If Washington fails to act, California should create its own “do not track me” system through the Legislature or the ballot box. The state that pioneered Internet commerce can also lead the way in ensuring that it does not run roughshod over one of our fundamental rights.

Press Release

NY Times Asks: Can Google Grow Without Becoming A Monopoly?

The New York Times editorial questioning Google’s purchase of online flight software company ITA raises questions that could well apply to any new business Google buys unless the Internet Goliath changes its business model.

FTC Endorses “Do Not Track Me,” Calls For A New Privacy Framework

If you wonder if you are being followed online and if anything can be done about it, take a look at the just-out Federal Trade Commission report on online privacy. A frightening amount of information is available about us online and the Federal Trade Commission has endorsed the notion of a “privacy by design” build-in for […]

LIVE BLOG: Notes on David Vladeck’s preview of the FTC report on online privacy

The FTC missed its deadline for posting its online privacy report online due to "technical problems"… Anti-trust panel going strong.   Watch live here http://www.visualwebcaster.com/consumerwatchdog   We had the first words on the report earlier at Consumer Watchdog's conference on the future of online consumer protection.    Report just came online about an hour late, a […]

Press Release

Our letter to Eric Schmidt: Google shouldn’t care more about its own privacy than ours

Google’s mission may be to open the world to information, but it is refusing to let our consumer group buy a search advertisement promoting wildly popular online animation that takes CEO Eric Schmidt to task over his statements about privacy issues. It seems the search giant cares a lot more about its own corporate privacy, than it does about its users’ privacy.

We have taken the “Do Not Track Me” fight to Times Square!

Right now, running twice an hour in Times Square, there’s a 540 sq. ft. animation of Google CEO Eric Schmidt giving little kids free ice cream and secretly gathering their personal information.
We put up the ad to make the public aware of how out of touch Schmidt and Google are when it comes to our privacy rights.

Watch our new Times Square video: Don’t Be Evil?

Do you want Google or any other online company looking over your shoulder and tracking your every move online just so it can increase its profits? Consumers have a right to privacy. They should control how their information is gathered and what it is used for.

Watch our video, and sign our petition telling Congress to make a “Do Not Track Me” list.

There’s no privacy in third world America

A big New York foundation once told me years ago that privacy is the last thing people in the developing world have to worry about. It was a nice way of saying no to funding for my consumer group’s privacy project, but the line rang out to me again this week as new reporting at the Wall Street Journal brings into focus the great privacy betrayals of America’s giant tech companies and Third World America, Arianna Huffington’s new book, makes its debut.

Will City of L.A. jump into Google’s cloud?

I spent all afternoon Monday waiting at the LA City Council Budget Committee to give the Council members my two minutes on why Google’s proposal to put the City’s computing into its cloud could be dangerous. In a nutshell: Security,…

Authors & consumers uniting against Google book deal

Google’s overreaching in trying to tightly control scanned digital copies of world literature has stuck an alarm bell with more than just consumers and the Justice Department