There have been privacy concerns popping up all around over GMail, Google’s free web-based e-mail service. Most of the uninformed concerns bugged me, but not enough to do a write up about it. Then I ran into the alarmist site G-Mail is too creepy, which summarizes the issues I’ve seen raised.
I thought I’d go over those issues and chime in myself.
Their problems with GMail are:
- GMail is nearly immortal
- Google’s policies do not apply
- A massive potential for abuse
- Inappropriate ad matching
Yes, you’re getting tons of space. People you’re e-mailing will probably not delete their messages, ever. Yes, GMail can modify their privacy policies whenever they want. Yes, the government can subpoena these e-mail messages.
So what?
Yes, ad matching may not be the best. It’s the price you pay for using a free service, and the same thing can happen with any other site you visit.
About changing the privacy policies, so can Yahoo, or Hotmail, or any other free e-mail service you’re using. It’s part of the system. It’s their server, they can do whatever the hell they want with it - the moment you agree to use their services, you have to abide by their rules.
If the people you’re e-mailing never delete their messages, it’s an user problem. GMail has nothing whatsoever to do with this, and if you’re sending somebody a clear text e-mail message (more on that later) filled with sensitive information, and they’re lazy enough not to delete it, you’re e-mailing sensitive information to the wrong people.
And sure, the government can subpoena these records whenever they want. Before you accuse me of just being a flunky to Draconian governments, you may want to take a look at my views on politics. But you know what, buddy? It’s not GMail that has Draconian conditions. They’re just complying with the Draconian laws of the government they’re operating on. Were you expecting a free (as in beer) service to fight for your private rights?
Bloody hell. Campaign against the Patriot Act, not against GMail complying with the jurisdiction it operates under.
And that bit about Google being able to keep a copy of every message sent to its service? Not only this is a possible problem with any other free e-mail services you may be using (or even with a company you’re renting a server from), but if the fact that there may be copies of the message floating around concerns you, well, it’s just because you don’t know how the Internet operates.
You may be thinking that when you go online to send an e-mail message (or read a web page, or download a file, or any other operation), there is some sort of magical tunnel being opened between your computer and the machine you’re contacting, a marvelous secure channel that only the machines at both ends can see into.
What happens is actually that each operation you attempt, for instance, sending an e-mail, is bounced across dozens or possibly hundreds of machines called routers, spread all across the globe and which allow the two machines (like your machine and your mail server, or your mail server and the destination e-mail server) to talk to each other.
Each and every one of these routers may, if they so wish, be maliciously keeping a copy of your messages.
I’ll repeat that: when you send an e-mail message, many machines around the world see it before it reaches its destination. And last time I checked, none of these routers had come around to show me their privacy policies.
So, should you just accept the inevitable and bend over? No. But if you’re going to be that paranoid, why the hell aren’t you using encryption?
Start worrying about the real problems, people, and do think before spreading FUD.
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