If you have any experience reading legal opinions or understand the architecture of the Internet, nothing in Google Legal's motion should surprise you. The alarming title is merely a citation of well-established legal doctrine, that a communications intermediary has the right to retain the information required to enable your communications, and that that data can be subpoenaed by government officials. There's nothing new (or surprising) in the quoted section.
Google hasn't admitted to anything that should be surprising for a free web-mail service. Except for the automatically-targeted ads, your ISP probably does most of the same stuff, and because your small-town ISP doesn't have Google's infrastructure, your data is likely less secure with them.
None of these facts matter. A major US newspaper just took that information out-of-context and created an alarming linkbait title. Most people who see that headline won't take the time to consider how valid it is; it will merely chip away at their confidence in Google as a provider (and in online systems in general).
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[ 3.3 ms ] story [ 19.8 ms ] threadAlso, it's probably more accurate to say "if you use Email, you have no legitimate expectation of privacy."
If you have any experience reading legal opinions or understand the architecture of the Internet, nothing in Google Legal's motion should surprise you. The alarming title is merely a citation of well-established legal doctrine, that a communications intermediary has the right to retain the information required to enable your communications, and that that data can be subpoenaed by government officials. There's nothing new (or surprising) in the quoted section.
Google hasn't admitted to anything that should be surprising for a free web-mail service. Except for the automatically-targeted ads, your ISP probably does most of the same stuff, and because your small-town ISP doesn't have Google's infrastructure, your data is likely less secure with them.
None of these facts matter. A major US newspaper just took that information out-of-context and created an alarming linkbait title. Most people who see that headline won't take the time to consider how valid it is; it will merely chip away at their confidence in Google as a provider (and in online systems in general).