[Calvinist_Dark_Lord]

meanwhile, google pilfers every event on your machine including your emails and puts it all into a statistical magic box and sells it to marketers as the keys to your soul and wallet.

The TrackMeNot extension for Firefox can fix that for you if you're using Firefox.

[the invisib1e hand]

While viewed from the perspective of user privacy this seems a good outcome, yet it does bring to light several disquieting points. First, from court documents we learn that AOL, Yahoo!, and Microsoft have complied with the government's request, though details are not given. Second, we must face the reality that logs of our online searches are in the hands of search companies and can be quite easily linked to our identities. Thirdly, it is clear we have little idea of, or say in, what can be done with these logs. While, in this instance, Google withheld such records from the Government, it would be foolish to count on this outcome in the future.

Great link, thank you.

This quote from the site begs a comment.

As one might expect from staff at NYU, the threat to privacy is cast as one from government.

Precious little has been said -- at least cohesively from a scholarly standpoint -- of the threat to privacy by any institution, including a private enterprise.

Is it so terrible for the government to be able to coerce a corporation into giving up its infinitely detailed databases on private citizens, but no less diabolical for that enterprise to buy and sell this information on you, compromising your privacy?

The right to privacy is universal, and it ought to be recognized as such. It does not diminish simply because more sophisticated technology implemented with ever lowering standards of community and dignity make it more difficult to protect; easier to compromise.

Rhetorical question: does the bimbo behind the counter at your bank branch really need to know your credit score? What's to keep her from knowing it?