When you buy an Android app from the Google app store, they give the app maker your full name, email address and the neighborhood where you live. This occurs without clear warning every single time you buy an app.
If you can’t trust Google’s app store, how can you trust them for anything?
Maybe Eric Schmidt can answer that for us.
Asked and answered, your honor.
Eric Schmidt: “We know where you are. We know where you’ve been. We can more or less know what you’re thinking about.”
“If you have something that you don’t want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn’t be doing it in the first place, but if you really need that kind of privacy, the reality is that search engines including Google do retain this information for some time, and it’s important, for example, that we are all subject in the United States to the Patriot Act. It is possible that, that information could be made available to the authorities.” – Erik Schmidt
Old news and not an Android issue. This is a Google Wallet feature. Anyone can sign up for Wallet and use it for whatever e-commerce products they want.
How is this old news? The Scroogled page has only just gone up.
I think Jim’s post is about Microsoft attacking Google, not Google’s privacy policies which, as you pointed out, is old news.
Personally I think this approach by Microsoft is kinda silly.
His post is about MSFT attacking Google but his remarks are all targeted at Google answering the trust question, which is based on Wallet.
He asked whether Eric could answer the questions posed on the page. That’s all.
Notice also that Jim didn’t say anything about Android – that was purely Microsoft.
Given Eric’s history of making fantastic comments on privacy in the past (maybe you should just move house, maybe your kids should change their name when they hit 18) I’d love to hear them as well!
From a comedic standpoint, he’d definitely give you a quality sound bite but I cringe when I see “Eric Schmidt said…” in a headline. 🙂
My “old news” bit was because this was discussed, heavily, months ago. MSFT is just late to the attack.
Agreed. Microsoft always late to the ball eh?
And how exactly does its origin or intent justify the action? I know you like to defend Google a lot, but enlighten me.
Given that there are some malicious or ripoff apps in Google Play whose main purpose are to either steal the users money (thinking its one app when it’s really not) or put malware on a users phone, is it really acceptable for these developers to be handed the users ADDRESS? And 90% of the time it’s just a single indie programmer, could be some 17 yr old living with his parents, who knows. But a developer who essentially commits a crime, is being handed personal private information about their targets? Forget about all the legitimate honest devs also being privy to this private info, this group of dishonest devs is the most concerning to me.
If you think that’s acceptable or justifiable, wowsers.
lol…yep. 🙂
I defend Apple just as much as Google. The Loop is openly Apple biased so you see more of my Google defense.
I’m not defending the feature, per se. I’m adding clarity where it is lost in that blurb. They are targeting Android specifically because they compete against it but the bigger issue is Wallet.
My apps are free so I can’t confirm/deny any of the data that is allowed/passed. Having done a fair bit of e-commerce though…this isn’t a big stretch or anything new. You do it with every single vendor you buy something from online and those vendors who allow others to sell through their stores (Amazon) do the same.
So to me…it is the way of the e-commerce world. Apple has a different policy for the App Store but it doesn’t make Wallet a catastrophe because it uses basic/common e-commerce practices.
The ‘Scroogled’ campaign is a ridiculous load of balls. Surely Microsoft can do better.
And with Jim’s return shall the extreme anti-Google activity begin. And with it, the ironic “why the anti-Apple agenda, can’t we be fair?”.
This was a major fuck up on Google’s part, although it was rectified as soon as it was discovered, but I think worse is the fact that a generally legitimate site like this would even give the thumbs up to Microsoft’s “Scroogled” campaign.
Ballmer has a bordering-on-the-insane hatred for Google and he will bring his own company down to bankruptcy lying and twisting every last detail he can about them. Ignoring the fact that Google has come to the top of the pile, along with Apple, with relentless diligence and being a good company. While MS has contributed nothing in years other than poor quality treatment of its customers, even the 360 has gone all Windows 8 and is ugly as balls now.
Uh, not exactly. Let’s say I order the soundtrack for Inception from Amazon; they are the ones that get my personal information, not the publishing label. If I purchase a DVD from Target (online or retail, for that matter), the information stays with Target, not the film studio (or distribution company).
If the order is being fulfilled by a third party on Amazon (and when that happens, it is very clearly marked), that third party gets the information they need to fulfill to order, nothing more; physical goods require an address for delivery, after all. Digital ones, on the other hand, do not.
To strip it down, the people that get personal information are the ones that are handling the transaction and providing the service, not the ones that created the product being purchased. App authors are the creators, not the service providers, and shouldn’t be getting customer information.
In your case, Amazon is the seller. With Wallet, I’m the seller, not Google. On Amazon, if you buy from another seller but through amazon.com, that seller gets your information.
That’s why Amazon calls out “Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.” When it is sold by another company through their site, that company gets your info.
It’s kind of funny this site is linking to a Microsoft funded propaganda site. Samsung has their online stooges and it looks like Microsoft also has a couple as well.
I’m trying to pinpoint the exact moment that Microsoft morphed into one of those toy breed dogs that follow you around going “yip yip yip yip” and nip at your heels.
Regardless, it looks like Google has addressed this “issue” in the latest Google Wallet release: http://www.droid-life.com/2013/04/22/google-removes-privacy-concerns-with-latest-wallet-update-for-developers/
So it’s OK for Samsung to attack Apple, but when Microsoft attacks Google, they are pathetic?
You know what I think is pathetic? You anti-Apple, Samsung Google loving sheep! Most of you are probably paid shills.
LMBO! You’re laughable. 😀 (needed that this morning)
Which of us “paid shills” called it pathetic?
My god! My name and email address went to someone I’m doing business with?
I am shocked and terrified.
No, wait. I don’t give a flying goddamn.
Nor do I care about the “neighborhood” part. Why should I?
That’s the part nobody seems to be able to tell me – why I should care.
(And no, “because some scammer might find out my email address and name” is not sufficient; my spam folder suggests that has already happened to zero effect.)