Google Claims Gmail Users Have No ‘Reasonable Expectation’ Their Emails Are Private

[Purveyor]

Critics call revelation ‘a stunning admission’ as Google makes claim in court filing in attempt to head off class action lawsuit

Gmail users have no “reasonable expectation” that their emails are confidential, Google has said in a court filing.

Consumer Watchdog, the advocacy group that uncovered the filing, called the revelation a “stunning admission.” It comes as Google and its peers are under pressure to explain their role in the National Security Agency’s (NSA) mass surveillance of US citizens and foreign nationals.

“Google has finally admitted they don’t respect privacy,” said John Simpson, Consumer Watchdog’s privacy project director. “People should take them at their word; if you care about your email correspondents’ privacy, don’t use Gmail.”

Google set out its case last month in an attempt to dismiss a class action lawsuit that accuses the tech giant of breaking wire tap laws when it scans emails in order to target ads to Gmail users.

That suit, filed in May, claims Google “unlawfully opens up, reads, and acquires the content of people’s private email messages.” It quotes Eric Schmidt, Google’s executive chairman: “Google policy is to get right up to the creepy line and not cross it.”

MORE...

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/08/14/google-claims-gmail-users-have-no-reasonable-expectation-their-emails-are-private/

[VanillaRhapsody]

1. I have said it before and I will say it again....

there is no privacy on the Internet. EVERY last bit has the potential to be seen by someone not necessarily intended for...

[Pholus]

2. You can't stop them looking, but you should be able to punish harshly for using/redistributing.

That kind of removes a lot of the commercial incentives which is why there are so many lobbyists of course. Non-commercial uses like blackmail? Obviously illegal in most cases.

Government archiving? Way, way, way across that "creepy line."

[okieinpain]

5. thank you, thank you, thank you. there is no reason

for people to get upset about companies or THE government collecting our data. if it's electronic it's going to happen it just too easy and actually we're to blame because if the system goes down we want it back up immediately and just like it was when it went down. which means they have to backup the system all the time, that's data collection folks.

now if we go back to using the usps and requesting analog phone lines, a lot of the data collection crap would go away.

[VanillaRhapsody]

15. Exactly...finally some DU'rs that understand how Internet and Databases work!

The entire Internet is archived....People must not know what the Internet WayBack Machine is...

[Th1onein]

26. Riiight! Google says we have no expectation of privacy, so we must not! Except Google didn't say

that.

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20130814/14262524177/press-suckered-anti-google-groups-bogus-claim-that-gmail-users-cant-expect-privacy.shtml

You know, if you really believe that we have no expectation of privacy because we are online, please give me your address, and your bank account number and passwords, too.

Thanks!

[Nuclear Unicorn]

3. The same goes for all those people who have

windows in their houses and apartments. Hey! You bought it that way! How can you expect people to not look through them? Totally your own fault.

[Pholus]

4. It's okay if you have nothing to hide...amiright?

Those curtains might be hiding a terrorist!

And why stop with curtains....

Your pants might well be concealing an underwear bomb.

Eventually, all pants will have to be transparent just so we can be sure!

[tk2kewl]

6. All citizens will be required to change their underwear every half hour...

Underwear will be worn on the outside so we can check.

[Generic Other]

9. A court agrees with your possibly sarcastic stance

UPDATE August 8, 2013: NEW YORK (AP) — A lawsuit brought against a New York City photographer who snapped pictures of his neighbors through their open windows without their knowledge or permission has been dismissed.

A state Supreme Court judge in Manhattan dismissed the case Monday. The judge ruled photographer Arne Svenson's art was protected by the First Amendment.

Read more: http://www.leaderherald.com/page/content.detail/id/355375/Judge-dismisses-lawsuit-against-NYC-photographer.html?isap=1&nav=5040 

[Nuclear Unicorn]

13. Sometimes I hate being right n/t

[PowerToThePeople]

11. ya.

[VanillaRhapsody]

16. Your entire Medical History is available to temp workers at the local hospital medical records dept.

and those workers are told the consequences of looking into your records...

[Nuclear Unicorn]

19. Threats of consequence seldom deter the determined / arrogant.

[VanillaRhapsody]

23. But it's a standard fact of life...

[hobbit709]

7. I have a gmail box because you need one to post on youtube.

I don't use it for anything else.

and I take great pleasure in marking all their crap they keeps ending me on it as SPAM with their own spam filter.

[Generic Other]

10. me too

they can link us to their crap but they can't make us use it.

[VanillaRhapsody]

17. Don't look now....but you're soaking in it!

[IDemo]

8. A question for the self-professed tech gurus

Do you consider the location and speed data of a GPS equipped auto (note: all of them, now) to be open game for automobile manufacturers and any parties they feel like providing that data? They did, after all, construct the vehicle. Isn't it their right to claim ownership of its user data?

[VanillaRhapsody]

18. Yes and using the self-serve cash register at the grocer cost American jobs

do you avoid those too?

[laundry_queen]

31. I do.

Maybe you've missed those threads, not being here overly long, but lots at DU do.

[VanillaRhapsody]

33. I also do...it was a rhetorical question perhaps too subtle for you....

[laundry_queen]

34. Yeah, maybe

I don't do subtle manipulation well. I leave that to the sociopathic exes of the world.

[Heywood J]

24. Constructing the vehicle =/= perpetual right of ownership.

They only own it until they sell it to the dealership. If they choose to record it until that moment, that's their choice. If the dealership chooses to record that data until the moment they sell it to me, that's their choice. The moment I take legal possession of the car, it's my data to choose. Out comes the fuse for remote telemetry and assistance, in comes the custom Canbus or J1939 module and reprogramming tool.

[IDemo]

27. Thanks, that was my point

Because autos and telecommunications systems are both vehicles in their own ways. Using either, I can investigate my world, look for bargains and choose to purchase or not. I can place myself with like minded people, be it politically or otherwise, and engage socially. With both of these vehicles there should come a sense of autonomy. Because you can follow someone from their driveway all day and track their comings and goings doesn't make that an ethically correct thing to do. Neither is tracking all internet connections or skimming email content simply because technology has provided the way.

I've worked in high tech a number of years and am somewhat familiar with how things operate. But frankly, I find the incessant forehead slappers more than a little tiresome on the topic of privacy.

[cthulu2016]

12. Don't be evil. Be EVIL!!!

[NightWatcher]

20. that's why I communicate via code on craigslist personal ads from Casper Wyoming

white male seeking a sticky greenish purple female who weighs between 2 and 3 ounces. Must be willing to meetup at McDonalds parking lot after midnight. Also, no cops.


Great, now I've got to change the code.

[Rex]

21. In other news, water is wet.

nt.

[Dr. Strange]

22. Well, not really.

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20130814/14262524177/press-suckered-anti-google-groups-bogus-claim-that-gmail-users-cant-expect-privacy.shtml

[Th1onein]

25. It's amazing to see them jumping up and down in glee: Yah! We have no expectation of privacy!

Talking about selling your soul to the devil. It's really sad, how they twist and spin, to cover the NSA's ass.

The article referenced above states that THIS is what Google said:

Non-Gmail users who send emails to Gmail recipients must expect that their emails will be subjected to Google's normal processes as the [email] provider for their intended recipients.

[TheKentuckian]

29. I've never seen such. These folks do not share my values. I don't get how we are supposed

to be allies. I don't even get how we are countrymen this far apart.

[Posteritatis]

28. Yeah, this is a tempest in a teapot

Glad someone provided the context as to why this is a non-issue, though I have no faith that it won't just be ignored around here.

[cynatnite]

30. I've never had an expectation that anything I put on the internet was private. n/t

[Recursion]

32. They've only said this the entire time. Hell, Gmail is *still in Beta*

and people use it for all their stuff.