Google: We've Been Busy And Successful With Our Anti-Piracy Work

[admin]

Google revealed this Friday that they've worked hard, introducing new tools and streamlined existing procedures to help combat net piracy.

A new set of tools that Google released earlier in the year now allow content to be removed from Google search results within 24 hours, while at the same time, streamlining the process of submitting DMCA 'takedown' requests for content holders. The tool is already being used by more than a dozen industry partners, and will be offered to others that have shown a good track record for legitimate takedown notices.

Google also revealed they've started tackling the issue of advertisements on websites that violate copyright. Google's AdSense allows webmasters to earn revenue from advertising, and many piracy websites in the past have taken advantage to the disgust of content holders. Google will now provide finer control for advertisers when it comes to placing ads, as well as a more streamlined review process for suspension of accounts for websites deemed to be "bad" by content holders.

Amongst other changes more filtering of piracy related keywords for Google's "autosuggest" feature, terms such as "torrent" and "rapidshare", and will also promote and offer more legal content via YouTube and Google eBookstore.

[drfsupercenter]

This is pathetic... I can't even remove personal information that shows up on Google when you search for my real name... things like my Amazon purchase history - their TOS states they'll ONLY be bothered to remove it if it reveals your credit card or social security number, otherwise they don't care

But they're making tools that let companies delete copyrighted content within 24 hours? PATHETIC. I want the ability to remove my private data from their search engine!

Perhaps I should register as a small business and say that Amazon is infringing my copyrights...?

[admin]

Good point about privacy. It's actually even scarier than you think, because not only does Google present private information other websites collect, they also collect a huge amount of personal information about you, even if you don't have a Google account.

They do this via a combination of cookies, your IP address, your browser info, your visiting search habits, and from dozens and dozens of these "signals", they can actually pin point exactly who you are without you even being logged in. They do this foremost to customize search results and ads for you. You can see this sometimes happening (while logged out of Google) by searching for a couple of related terms, and then going to a totally non related website, and the Google ads shown there are actually related to your past searches, not the current content.

Another way to see this in action is to search for a term that is likely to invoke personlisation (again, while logged out, and with search history and customization turned off), for example "political blogs", and then clear your cookies or use Chrome's incognito mode (or Firefox with the incognito add-on), then search for the same term again, and you'll most likely see different results, the first set is customized for you, the second one is a bit more generic - but even with cookies cleared, there are still dozens of other "public" signals they can track and identify you by.

The dangers of this isn't just that marketers have access to your information, that it could also derail the democratic process by "giving people what they want to see", and further polarize people's opinions on a wide variety of issues, a phenomenon best described in this video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B8ofWFx525s

[drfsupercenter]

Hmm, I wasn't aware Google was doing that now. I know some people complained about Bing when it opened, the whole personalized results thing.

But I know my mom actually has a Google background image set and she doesn't have an account, not sure how that works.

I usually say no to using Google Analytics in things like Android apps that ask if I want to enable it, etc, since who knows what they do with all that data? But really, I wouldn't mind as much if they'd let you remove things from the search engine... maybe providing some sort of proof that you're the person described in whatever website, to prevent abuse?

[liveoutloud]

It is scary. I once posted a letter of recommendation from a Navy Seal that I got. Not realizing his name needed to be blurred out... Good luck getting that off the net...