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Mountain View,
Calif.
– Following criticism over
the privacy settings on its new Buzz social features on its Gmail service,
Google (NASD: GOOG) last night announced a raft of changes to thes service based on users’
feedback.

"In particular there’s been concern from some people who thought
their contacts were being made public without their knowledge (in particular
the lists of people they follow, and the people following them)," Google
said in a blog post.

"In addition, others felt they had too little control
over who could follow them and were upset that they lacked the ability to block
people who didn’t yet have public profiles from following them."

The
corresponding changes Google made to Buzz will make the option to not show
followers or people a user follows on their public profiles more visible; allow
users to block anyone who starts following them; and provide more clariety on
which of a user’s followers and people they follow can appear on their public
profiles.

However, some critics are saying that Google needs to go
further with the privacy settings with Buzz, for instance making the sharing of
Gmail contacts with whom a user most frequently interacts an opt-in, rather
than opt-out choice.

 

Related Links:
http://snipurl.com/uck2x

(Google blog post)

http://news.cnet.com/8301-30684_3-10452412-265.html

http://snipurl.com/uck37
(Business Insider)

http://techcrunch.com/2010/02/12/google-buzz-privacy

2 COMMENTS

  1. The amount of data that is taken to build up user profiles by Google is epic. This invasion of privacy is all in the name of marketing. I work in marketing but this is definatly a step to far, i think Google’s aproach it taking liberties.

  2. The violation of privacy is simply shocking. Shocking. I have deleted my gmail account and am done doing business with the evil empire, be it chrome, android, search or otherwise. Google, brace yourself for another round in court. Tragic mistake!

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