Google is Everywhere

According to Scroogle,

“Google is asking webmasters who use AdSense,  to update their privacy policy and warn of Google’s new tracking system.

[The DoubleClick DART cookie is used by Google in the ads served on publisher websites displaying AdSense for content ads. When users visit an AdSense publisher’s website and either view or click on an ad, a cookie may be dropped on that end user’s browser. The data gathered from these cookies will be used to help AdSense publishers better serve and manage the ads on their site(s) and across the web.]

If you see any big sites with AdSense (“Ads by Google” — JavaScript required) that have not updated their policy by Google’s 2009-04-08 deadline,

[The posted privacy policy should include the following information about Google and the DoubleClick DART cookie:

• Google, as a third party vendor, uses cookies to serve ads on your site.
• Google’s use of the DART cookie enables it to serve ads to your users based on their visit to your sites and other sites on the Internet.
• Users may opt out of the use of the DART cookie by visiting the Google ad and content network privacy policy.]

email that site’s owner. If they ignore you, scroogle@lavabit.com wants the URL of that site.   We plan to compile a list !

We might ask Google to pull these AdSense accounts if the list gets long enough. If that doesn’t work, some privacy activists may decide to complain to the FTC.“

More information:    Link1 Link2 Link3 Link4 Link5

Fear not soldiers there is ccleaner, a fantastical tool that will annihilate cookies and a whole lot more.

I like my privacy.

-Cara

Some More Scroogle

I saw a hipster on the subway tonight, sporting a puma bag while wearing his black satin jacket with “Google” emblazoned on one of his sleeves.

Are people so easily distracted?

-Cara

Scroogle the New and Less Evil Google

I noticed a new referrer link on my blog tonight (scroogle.org/cgi-bin/nbbw.cgi) and I thought, why does that sound so familiar, so I hit up scroogle.org. And who did I discover, but my old friends from Google Watch (I have written about these guys in other blogs and have been a supporter for a long time.)

Google is creepy and possibly evil; might I recommend you to stay off their chat and search engine?

Scroogle.org states and I agree, “Not only does Google scrape much of the web, but they keep records of who searches for what. If information about your searching is accessible by cookie ID or by your IP address, it is subject to subpoena. This is a violation of your privacy. Someday Google’s data retention practices will be regulated, because Google is too arrogant to do the right thing voluntarily. In the meantime, you should not be leaving your fingerprints in Google’s databases.”

Here is a link to how Scroogle’s SSL option protects your privacy.

So you can use Scroogle.org to search the internet and here is a cool option for a chat service that will not keep your chats indefinitely, that I use. They are Zoho Chat. They have a bunch of other features you can check out at their site. I use their Chat and their Project’s application, which is also cool and can be found at Zoho.com. I found this site after I refused to get on Google to chat, so thanks to Zoho everyone can chat Google free!

Google is not cool.

-Cara