Google encrypts cloud data to quell PRISM fears

[bemildred]

Google has added automatic encryption to its non-consumer Cloud Storage service in response to the public outcry over the Obama administration's PRISM surveillance programme.

Although Google Cloud Storage is used only by companies including Ubisoft, Rovio, Best Buy, these firms use the service to host customer data.

The web giant has amped up security on the platform with the introduction of the 128-bit Advanced Encryption Standard (AES), the same level of protection Google applies to its own data.

The company was also quick to point out that it will only hand user data to the government under the terms of the law.

http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/tech/news/a507349/google-encrypts-cloud-data-to-quell-prism-fears.html

[Cooley Hurd]

1. What about MY fucking gmail, Google??

Or MY Google Drive? I'm a paying customer. I buy friggin' apps and music from your App Store. Why don't I rate??

[peacebird]

2. So freaking what? As soon as the NSA asks they will provide the key anyhow....

[ljm2002]

3. The only encryption you can trust...

...is the encryption that you do yourself, on your own machine, before sending your data anywhere. Preferably using open source tools, since these have been vetted by a large community of smart, critical minds who have looked for backdoors etc. and have not found any.

Trusting Google on this would be silly. If they are doing the encrypting, then they have the key. Sure, it will prevent the NSA from being able to scan the data for keywords -- once the data is encrypted; but then again, some of the stories we have read indicate the government gets the data as it comes into the servers and splits it off to do whatever they do with it, so if it was not encrypted coming in then the NSA may be scanning it anyway. And, if the government orders them to decrypt anything, they will be obliged to do so and they will have the capability to do so.