To Google, Anonymous = We Still Kinda Know Who You Are

On Sept. 9th, Google announced they improved their privacy policy by anonymizing users’ IP addresses in their logs after 9 months versus their old policy of 18 months.
Recently, CNET’s Chris Soghoian asked Google to explain exactly how they make users anonymous.
The answer is discomforting: Google told Chris they remove “some bits” of your IP address after 9 months, and after 18 months they delete the last section of your IP. Oh, and there’s a unique cookie associated with the IP that is never deleted.
Crash course – IP addresses look like this: 192.102.155.788. The first 3 sections, or “octets,” tell servers (like Google) a ton about you — where you are geographically and what ISP you’re using to connect, for starters, while the last 3 numbers uniquely identify your specific computer.
Google is basically saying after 9 months, they change your IP to 192.102.155.7xx, and after 18 they change it to 192.102.155.xxx. By matching this IP, timestamps, the unique cookie and other easily accesible data, it would be very simple to pinpoint who you are.
Tiny commentary: What happened to “Don’t be evil”? Google better get serious about privacy instead of PR, and fast.

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Made tiny from: Mashable.com original post

Benjamin Wright

If Google can assert its legal terms just by publishing them (on something less than its homepage), then maybe users can assert their own terms of privacy protection just by publishing them! A user might say in her published terms of service that search engines cannot keep records of her searches longer than 2 weeks. What do you think? --Ben http://hack-igations.blogspot.com/2008/05/google-privacy-policy-terms-of-service.html My ideas are not legal advice for anyone, just something to discuss.