Google spies on iPhone users: Should the feds clamp down?

The search giant deployed a special code to bypass Apple's privacy settings — and track millions of users' surfing habits Apple's Safari browser is designed to shield users from tracking by advertisers. This apparently didn't sit well with Google, which decided to give Safari's privacy settings the runaround, according to The Wall Street Journal. As a result, Safari users were tracked without their permission, on both their mobile devices and desktops. When the news got out, Google quickly shut down the code, and stressed that the tracking software — known as cookies — did not appropriate any personal information. But lawmakers are calling for an investigation into the incident, the latest in a slew of privacy controversies for the company. Should the government get tougher on Google?

Yes. Google broke the law — and it's all because of Facebook: Google "has now started to violate the law, and certainly to undermine the trust that the company depends on," says Cory Doctorow at BoingBoing. Why? Because Google is experiencing an "enormous internal urgency" to spread the use of Google Plus, its social-networking component. It bypassed Safari's privacy settings to place a "+1" icon next to ads, just like Facebook's "like" function. It's time for Google quit the invasive tactics and "slow its full-court press" on Google Plus. 
"WSJ: Google caught circumventing iPhone security, tracking users who opted out of third-party cookies"

Google claims it was an accident — but that's what it always says: Google claims that it was merely trying to enhance the experience of Google users on Safari, and that it did not intend to bypass privacy settings, says Ian Paul at PCWorld. But haven't we heard that before? "Every time Google is found to be up to no good, the company uses virtually the same excuse: 'Oops, sorry, that was a mistake, we didn't know we were doing that.'" And if Google simply wanted to improve Safari's "functionality," there was no need to "deploy an invisible method beyond the control of the user."
"Will the FTC investigate Google's Safari gaffe?"

People, relax. You're being tracked whether you like it or not: Did Google "screw up by using underhanded tactics?" asks Jared Newman at TIME. Sure, but as far as privacy violations are concerned, "I rank that pretty low on the list of offenses." The truth is that "data mining is the norm," and the result of Google's behavior — more targeted advertising — "is fairly innocuous." Unless you "take a dozen precautions, odds are that marketing companies already know plenty about you."
"Google's Safari privacy snafu: just not feeling the outrage"

SEE MORE: Coming soon: Google-powered 'Terminator' glasses?

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Access to Google Sites Returns in Iran, as Mysteriously as It Disappeared

#Iran Strangles the #Internet Ahead of Elections zite.to/yDyfLD

— Amin Sabeti (@aminsabeti) February 14, 2012

After a disruption of access in Iran to Google’s e-mail services and other international Web sites starting last Thursday, access appeared to be restored on Monday, raising questions about whether it was a censorship test by the government for coming elections or an effort to quell possible street protests.

It was a year ago on Feb. 14 that the Green movement leaders Mir Hussein Moussavi and Mehdi Karroubi were placed under house arrest for contesting the results of the disputed 2009 presidential vote. Observers of Iran questioned whether the recent disruption may have been an effort to restrict encrypted communication before the parliamentary elections on March 2, prevent demonstrations on behalf of the imprisoned leaders or perhaps conduct a test for a widely anticipated government-run internet.

Since Iranians turned to social networks and the streets during the disputed election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in 2009, the government has blocked access to YouTube.com and other sites. Over the last two years, people have reported that Twitter and Facebook and other major social networks have also been largely inaccessible, according to data collected by Herdict.org, a project by the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard that examines access to the Internet around the world.

The recent disruption affected international sites using the Secure Sockets Layer protocol, which displays addresses beginning with HTTPS, allowing users the ability to send and search encrypted messages and avoid government scrutiny.

“Last fall Google switched to encrypted search by default, and the situation in Iran might represent a focus on restricting encrypted traffic — information that’s more difficult for the government to eavesdrop upon,” said Jonathan Zittrain, a professor at Harvard Law School and co-founder of the Berkman Center.

Twitter and Facebook have moved in the last year toward using the Secure Sockets Layer protocol to increase security for their users.

Since the Iranian government has not assumed responsibility for the outage, Ronald Deibert, director of the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto, said it was impossible to say precisely what was behind it. He said Iranian leaders had spoken in recent months about creating a “clean internet, safe for the moral values they hold.”

“They want to nationalize the internet,” said Mr. Deibert, who is also one of the principals behind the Open Net Initiative. “This may have been a test to prepare the groundwork.”

Many people in Iran are able to get around government blockages, however, using proxies and VPN.

Amin Sabeti, a blogger and researcher who writes about Iran from Britain, said the Iranian government wanted to create its own version of the internet because it viewed the Internet as an enemy. He said that government leaders began to attack Google more aggressively two or three months ago, claiming it was “a spy tool.”

“Today, one of the members of Iran’s Internet filtering council said Google is using SSL and we cannot monitor it, therefore we’ve blocked Gmail and Google’s services,” Mr. Sabeti said.

On Global Voices, the international blogging platform, some bloggers said they suspected the disruption was aimed at limiting communication in the weeks ahead of the election and among people supportive of the Green movement. “This blocking can be considered as the regime’s attempt to stop Green activists from informing people to take part in demonstrations in the final days of February,” said a writer for the blog, Azadi-Esteqlal-Edalat.

Iran’s Ministry of Communications and Technology has denied knowing of the disruption, saying the origin was elsewhere.

“Everything is up now and running as normal,” said Earl Zmijewski, vice president and general manager of Renesys, a New Hampshire-based company that analyzes global Internet traffic.

This post has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: February 15, 2012

An earlier version of this post misspelled the surname of Ronald Deibert.

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