[AusNOG] Google creepier than Conroy?

[Narelle]

Google to hand over intercepted data

By Maija Palmer and Lionel Barber in London
June 3 2010 23:04

Google will begin handing over to European regulators the rogue data
it intercepted from private WiFi internet connections within the next
two days, in an effort to defuse growing controversy over its latest
privacy blunder.

Eric Schmidt, chief executive, said the world’s largest internet
company would hand over information initially to the German, French
and Spanish data protection authorities. Germany is considering a
criminal investigation into the practice. Google faced a stand-off
with Hamburg privacy authorities last week over whether it would be
legal to hand over the rogue data. It now appears willing to reach a
compromise.

The company will also publish the results of an external audit into
the practice, in which cars photographing streets for Google’s Street
View service ended up also collecting snippets of personal information
from unsecured WiFi networks.

Mr Schmidt admitted he could not rule out the possibility that
personal data such as bank account details were among the data
collected.

etc at:
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/db664044-6f43-11df-9f43-00144feabdc0.html

Here is the Senate estimates record on the topic here:
http://www.aph.gov.au/Senate/committee/eca_ctte/estimates/bud_1011/index.htm
 ref May 24


So Google is alleged to have:
- incorporated wifi aware code into its streetview surveys for the
last couple of years
- actively intercepted data passing across unsecured wireless LANs as
it drove along

There are reports that this data may have included emails and scans of
file stores on the unsecured wireless LANs, but I haven't verified
that.


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Narelle
narellec at gmail.com