Google Declines To Turn Over Harvested Wi-Fi Data 201
An anonymous reader writes "Google declined to submit data collected as part of the 'Spy-Fi' flap, and Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal is now promising further action: '"I certainly will be pressing for continued involvement at the federal level in coordination with the states," Blumenthal told Politico Monday, just days after promising to explore "additional enforcement actions" if Google does not share the data soon. Asked to describe what those federal efforts might include, the outgoing attorney general said, "There's a range of potential opportunities for oversight and scrutiny by a member of the US Congress – including letters, meetings, hearings, and potentially even legislation." For its part, Google has tried to defuse the issue by offering to delete the data. The company reaffirmed that position in a Friday statement, promising to work with Blumenthal in the coming weeks, but declined to comment further on Monday.'"
Re:Should have deleted it from the start (Score:2, Interesting)
Google should have the right to do anything they want with this data. If it is unencrypted and transmitted over open airwaves (AKA no WPA or even WEP for that matter) then that's not Google's fault. If it were encrypted then that might be a different matter, but I am still of the opinion that anyone has the right to receive RF communication as long as they do not trespass, etc, to do so.
Re:Do the Right Thing (Score:2, Interesting)
Maybe, but Google is one of the 5 companies I think is smart enough to play the Long-Script game.
Of course they could have played Corporation Games and squashed it, but instead maybe they're using a carefully chosen test-case to get certain predictable events "over with".
Right after the early Dot-Com crash I (among many to be sure) I noticed the Gaping Abyss concept: once the original "This Time Will Be Different" sales-mood of Dot Com 1.0 crashed, I felt that medium-soon we'll just be staring at a bunch of years of "small-village boredom" ahead of us. When small villages become bored, the members get into each other's business with a hyper-sensitive event amplifier. "Oh my gawd, Catcher in the Rye has Bad Words in it!"
Okay, if Web 1.0 was Sales, 2.0 was Sharing, one candidate for 3.0 is Walled Garden & Censorship, and I speculate that 4.0 will be a Privacy Revolt.