You are here

DoubleClick

Why Google is Big Brother Inc. – A One-Page Graphic -- Part 33 Google Disrespect for Privacy Series

Google is the only company with a mission to organize the world’s public and private information, and it is also unique in having developed more ways, to monitor more people’s behavior, more intimately than any entity ever.

Please see this one page graphic summary to get a big picture view of the almost unimaginable scale and scope of the intimate private information that Google routinely records and analyzes. 

Since all other companies have much more narrow and focused businesses and missions than Google’s unbounded ambitions, they represent a fraction or slice of the whole public and private data pie that Google collects, stores, and analyzes.

Other than Google, only an Orwellian “Big Brother” state would aspire to collect and store indefinitely all private, intimate information on everyone online like Google is doing.

We know information is power.

The problem with Google becoming Big Brother Inc., is that if a state were to combine its state powers with Google’s unique information monopoly, unaccountability, and surveillance powers, it creates huge natural temptations for corruption and abuse in the absence of meaningful competition, strong checks and balances, and real public accountability.

Why Google is America’s Cybersecurity Achilles Heel -- Part 14 Security is Google’s Achilles Heel Series

Every system has a most vulnerable point, an Achilles heel. The overwhelming evidence below indicates that Google is America’s cybersecurity Achilles heel.

While America faces a plethora of serious cybersecurity vulnerabilities, Google’s unique scale, scope, tracking, and centralization puts Google alone at the pinnacle of America’s cybersecurity vulnerabilities, in a class all by itself.

Simply, hackers understand Google is by far the world’s single most-comprehensive source of intimate surveillance information on people and their behaviors, while also being the major entity that is least-committed culturally to protecting people’s security, privacy, and property.

DOJ & FTC Report Cards -- My Daily Caller Op-ed

In advance of the Senate Antitrust oversight hearing for the DOJ and FTC Tuesday, please see my Daily Caller op-ed "DOJ & FTC Antitrust Report Cards" -- here -- to learn two of the big oversight questions for the hearing.

This is Part 20 in the Google Unaccountability Research Series.

***

Google Unaccountability Research Series:

Part 0: Google's Poor and Defiant Settlement Record

Part 1: Why Google Thinks It Is Above the Law

Part 2: Top Ten Untrue Google Stories

Part 3: Google's Growing Record of Obstruction of Justice

Google's Privacy Words vs Google's Anti-Privacy Deeds

To understand why Google owns the single worst privacy record over the last decade of any Global 2000 corporation, listen to what Google’s leadership says about privacy-related matters in their own words. Then compare what Google Says about privacy below, with Google’s Privacy Rap Sheet – current up to June 4, 2012.  

 

Google's Global Antitrust Rap Sheet -- Google Now Has Violated Antitrust Laws in 10 Different Ways

Given that Google has just submitted detailed antitrust remedies to rectify the EU's findings that Google has abused its market dominance in four different ways, and given that earlier this year the FTC found that Google violated antitrust laws in a fifth different way, it is instructive and important to simply chronicle all of Google antitrust violations in one place to let the consistency, breadth, and seriousness of Google's anti-competitive behavior sink in.

Please don't miss: "Google's Global Antitrust Rap Sheet" -- here.

First, it shows that Google has violated antitrust laws in TEN DIFFERENT ways over the last five years!

Second, Google is under antitrust scrutiny, investigation, or supervision in NINE DIFFERENT countries and the EU.

  • It is telling that most everywhere Google goes antitrust scrutiny or other trouble with the law follows.

The obvious takeaway here is Google is a global serial antitrust offender and recidivist.

Oversight Questions for FTC's Handling of Google Antitrust Probe -- Part 12 Google Unaccountability Series

The number and seriousness of irregularities, deficiencies, and unanswered questions in the FTC's antitrust investigation of Google's alleged search bias warrant oversight by the Senate and House Antitrust Subcommittees and investigative reporting by the media.

Google News-ster, Books-ster, YouTube-ster, Android-ster -- Google's Disrespect for Property Part 13

Newspaper and magazine interests in Germany, France, and Brazil are fighting back against Google News' monetization of their headlines and property without compensation by urging lawmakers to pass laws requiring royalties or revenue sharing for ancillary copyright use of their core product news, per AP and NYT reports.

This piece supports three conclusions.

The Unique Google Privacy Problem -- My Presentation to Korean Privacy Council in Seoul

Please see my new powerpoint presentation here: "The Unique Google Privacy Problem; Why Google's Forced-Integrated Privacy Policy is So Problematic," which I presented to the Korea Council on the Protection of Personal Information in Seoul Korea this week.

Please don't miss slide 4: "Google's Monopoly Power = Unique Global Privacy Problem: Unfathomable Scale, Scope and Centralization of Private Info." It provides the latest eye-popping stats on Google's rapidly spreading dominance into video, mobile and social.

Also important not to miss are slides 9-10, which present my new conclusions about what Google's forced-integration of its privacy policy means for sovereign nations and the world at large, given the EU/CNIL's strong challenge last week to Google's privacy policy changes without user permission or opt-out option.

This analysis should be of great interest to the ~35 privacy authorities around the world which currently oppose Google's forced-integrated privacy policy (and other nations and privacy professionals as well), because it provides strong evidence, supporting rationale and conclusions to help nations address the #1 global privacy problem.

 

"Pro-trust" EU Competition Remedies for Google's Antitrust Violations

Google remains its own worst enemy in trying to resolve EU antitrust charges.

In early 2012, when Google was trying to convince EU antitrust authorities that enforcement action against Google's search practices -- preferring its own content in search ranking over competitors -- would only harm consumers and was unnecessary because competition was but "a click away" for consumers, Google announced it would consolidate 60 privacy policies without user permission or user choice to opt-out, and then did it a month later, over the EU's strong objections.

This was a flagrant strategic mistake because: first the EU prides itself for strong consumer privacy laws and privacy protections; second the EU fully-understands that consumers' privacy is the de facto currency that Google uses to propel its monopoly; and third Google's primary antitrust defense is that they are the ones that are best looking out for consumers interests and that consumers have plenty of choice.

Google's Top Ten Anti-Privacy Quotes -- Part 3 In Google's Own Words Series

It's timely to review Google's public attitude towards privacy, given reports that the EU officially has found legal fault with Google's big change in its privacy policy last March, in which Google forced integration of sixty previously-separate privacy policies on users without explicit user consent.

Google: in its own words:

Pages