Year: 2006

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Privacy Subtleties of GMail

Here’s yet another take on GMail privacy – Privacy Subtleties of GMail. This time it comes from a guy who had to balance his opinion between two polar sides he is at:

I come to this problem from two sides. One, I’m a fan of Google, and have been friends with Google’s management since they started the company. I’ve also consulted for Google on other matters and make surprising revenue from their Adsense program on my web site.

I’m also a privacy advocate and Chairman of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, well regarded as one of the top civil rights advocates in cyberspace. The EFF has issued some statements of privacy concern over GMail, though we declined joining the coalition against it. (I’m writing this as my own essay, though with some advice from the EFF team.) I’ve also had a chance to talk at length with Google President Larry Page about some of the issues.

The Trouble with Gmail

Mark Rasch shares his GMail concerns in the article at Security Focus titled The Trouble with Gmail.

perhaps the most ominous thing about the proposed Gmail service is the often-heard argument that it poses no privacy risk because only computers are scanning the e-mail. I would argue that it makes no difference to our privacy whether the contents of communications are read by people or by computers programmed by people.

The Fuss About Gmail and Privacy: Nine Reasons Why It’s Bogus

Tim O’Reilly is always a worthy read. Here are some quotes.

On the future of storage:

I remember Bob Morris, head of IBM’s Storage Division and the Almaden Research Labs, telling me a couple of years ago, that before too long, storage would be cheap enough and small enough that someone who wanted to do so could film every moment of his life, and carry the record around in a pocket. Scary? Maybe. But the future is always scary to those who cling to the past. It is enormously exciting if you focus on the possibilities. Just think how much value Google and other online information providers have already brought to all of our lives — the ability to find facts, in moments, from a library larger than any of us could have imagined a decade ago.

On the future of computers:

At my conference on peer-to-peer networking, web services, and distributed computation back in 2001, Clay Shirky, reflecting on “Lessons from Napster”, retold the old story about Thomas J. Watson, founder of the modern IBM. “I see no reason for more than five of these machines in the world,” Watson is reputed to have said. “We now know that he was wrong,” Clay went on. The audience laughed knowingly, thinking of the hundreds of millions, if not billions, of computers deployed worldwide. But then Clay delivered his punch line: “We now know that he overstated the number by four.”

On Google:

Pioneers like Google are remaking the computing industry before our eyes. Google of course isn’t one computer — it’s a hundred thousand computers, by report — but to the user, it appears as one.

Visit to a Russian shop

Ice cream

There are plenty of Russians living in Cyprus. And, as usual in such situations, there are plenty of Russian shops around. Those shops sell all sorts of stuff “from Russia with love” – books, drinks, food…

For a totally unknown reason, both Olga and I never went to any of these shops. One time or the other we’d imagine that we did, to buy something that we miss, but we never actually went there.

Until today.

I don’t know about Olga, but for me – I’m glad that I went there AFTER my recent trip to Russia. Most of the stuff looked familiar and I was navigating around pretty good. If I came before the trip, I’d be totally disoriented by the brands around. I wouldn’t know what is what and how to use it. Gladly, it didn’t happen.

I needed less than five minutes to buy some sunflower seeds for Olga, and some ice cream for myself. Done and out. It wasn’t as bad as it could have been. We’ll probably go back some time soon…