Inside Google

Google struggles to defend Apps security

Google’s recent release of a white paper on its security policies and technologies for Google Apps is notable for its effort to assure users and potential customers that the information stored by Google is safe. And perceptions about the Internet giant’s security are key to its future.

Closing Windows: Was it about security or the money?

Last month, The Financial Times reported that Google was blaming Microsoft software vulnerability for the multinational cyber attack it encountered earlier this year. In response, unnamed Google employees said, the company was phasing out the Windows operating system at the company. But, maybe it’s about the money.

New Google option: look like Bing home page

Google is known for the “clean simple look” of its home page at Google.com. Bing has earned praise for the gorgeous photos changing daily on the Bing home page, stocked by Microsoft’s Corbis imagery.

Now Google has announced that you will be able to clutter up your Google.com page with a photo too.

Personalized search: Searching in a Bubble?

My Google search results are looking too familiar. Looking for something new on the web for a topic of continuing interest, I enter some familiar terms. The same old sites keep turning up. OK, so Google is returning the most relevant results, based on the Google algorithm. Why do they seem so stale?

Join the “1 out of 15” opting out for privacy

Last Tuesday in this space, I opted out of Google’s “interest-based advertising.” Later the same day, Google unveiled an opt-out tool for another personal information collection agent – Google Analytics.

Website owners can use Google Analytics to track visitors on their sites and Google collects the data from all the visits for its own use.

With $26.5 billion to invest, Google’s investment team sets up shop

Google has opened its own trading desk to manage its $26.5 billion in cash and short-term investments, according to Bloomberg Businessweek.  Heading the team is company treasurer Brent Callinicos, who joined Google from Microsoft in 2007.  Under Callinicos, Google has built a “state of the art” cash management system, with technology that allows traders to […]

Google’s America: White and Male

Google’s Economic Impact 2009 report (see Consumer Watchdog’s statement) released online and at a series of press events around the country on Tuesday, shows an off-key bias about our nation’s citizens.

Protect your privacy on Google: Tips from Computerworld

A great “smart paranoid’s guide to using Google” at Computerworld today takes you step by step through “down-and-dirty details on how to maintain your privacy while using Google’s myriad services.” It’s chock full of precautions, security tips and instructions on how to disengage from Google collections of  information about you. The guide takes you from […]

News pundit evangelizes for friends at Google

James Fallows’s cover story in the Atlantic is titled “Inside Google: The Company’s Daring Plan to Save the News (and itself)”. On the web it’s just “How to Save the News.” I thought the article was a big wet kiss.

Germans incensed by Google’s WiFi snooping on personal data; activity called illegal

Germany’s Consumer Affairs Minister Ilse Aigner blasted Google over the weekend for its “accidental” collection of personal data by Street View cars driving by the homes of citizens in Germany (and the U.S. and other countries all around the world).