Google has been taking a lot of flak lately for its privacy policies. Some people are saying that Google is going too far with the information that they collect and store. You may be asking why this is such a big story now, because the privacy policy of the company hasn’t changed dramatically over the year. The reason it is important now, is that Google is in the process of buying Double Click, which is a company that does ad tracking.Â
The deal hasn’t gone through yet, because it still needs to be approved by the FTC first, but if it does, the way that Internet advertising works could be changed forever.Â
With Google and Double Click working together, advertisers will be able to have all the information about you in one company. The websites that are searched and visited by your computer are already stored in Google’s massive databanks for a year and a half. Now Google will also have information about what ads you click and what you buy.Â
Google of course says that this will be a positive change for Internet surfers, because it will allow advertisers to know more about what type of person you are and base their advertisements on that. Others who are against the purchase say that too much information is being given to Google, and that this is just one more massive database that the company is making with people’s private information. Privacy International, a consumer privacy watchdog, ranked Google at the bottom of the barrel for privacy among Internet search engines; ranking them even worse than AOL (did you ever think you would hear that?).
Will there be a revolt against Google? Probably not, but if enough people are bothered by the fact that their privacy policies are really light things might just change. So what should you do: stop using Google or stop worrying?Â
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