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Congressman Pushes For Another Google Probe 
By: Doug Caverly 2010-11-09 Late last month, the FTC ended its investigation of Google's collection of sensitive WiFi data, choosing not to pursue any formal reprimands or punishments at that time. However, it looks like not everyone in the U.S. government is ready to let the matter go, as Representative Joe Barton has made some accusatory comments.
According to Sara Jerome, Barton claimed during a recent C-SPAN interview that Google's actions weren't the result of poor quality control when it came to checking code. "In that case there appears to have been a conscious effort to collect information," he said. The lawmaker, who might become chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, then added, "Google said it was inadvertent, but it wasn't just kind of accidentally gathered, and so I do think that's something to look at." Barton apparently isn't alone in this opinion, either. "I know Congressman -Edward Markey- is concerned about it on the Democrat side, and Chairman -Henry Waxman- is concerned about it," he said. So it looks like Google could be in for another investigation. Perhaps a much more hostile, public investigation, with bipartisan backing, at that. It's quite possible an inquiry of this nature would result in Google facing big fines or maybe new privacy legislation, since the search giant has admitted that its Street View cars captured "entire emails and URLS . . . as well as passwords." Or even if that worst-case scenario doesn't occur, Google would definitely take a hit on the PR front, with the company's "don't be evil" motto getting tossed around and lots of people thinking twice about how much information they give it. That, in turn, could lead to Google's share of the search market decreasing, along with its advertising revenues. So count on Google's Washington, D.C.-based employees paying lawmakers a lot more visits over the next few weeks, and another post or two proclaiming the company's innocence is likely to appear on the Google Public Policy Blog, as well. It should be interesting to see how this all works out. We'll be sure to report on any significant developments. About the Author: Doug is a staff writer for SearchNewz, WebProNews, InternetFinancialNews, and SecurityProNews. |
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