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Why has economic inequality increased so radically in the United States over the last generation? General explanations range from globalization to the decline in trade unions to rising returns to education — and therefore the…
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John M. Simpson, director of Consumer Watchdog’s Privacy Project commented on the news, “A top Google executive will finally face serious questioning about the company’s behavior.”
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A leading California consumer group has formally asked White House counsel to rule on the ethics of what it calls the Obama Administration’s “inappropriate” outreach — including State Dinner invites — to head honchos of Google, a firm reportedly under criminal investigation by the Justice Department.
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Google “pretty clearly is using its dominant position to its own advantage,” said John Simpson, spokesman for Consumer Watchdog, a nonprofit advocacy organization that has called for an investigation into Google’s practices for the past two years.
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Consumer Watchdog is telling the White House that its cozy relationship with Google is inappropriate, given ongoing reviews by both the FTC and the Department of Justice.
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Consumer Watchdog has been clamoring for Schmidt’s sworn testimony before Congress for over a year, ever since Germany caught Google harvesting private Wi-Fi data from unsecured Wi-Fi networks in homes and businesses across the globe. Google had dispatched fleets of specially equipped cars through city streets in 30-plus nations to gather this data.
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“These aren’t smartphones — they are spy phones,” said John M. Simpson, director of Consumer Watchdog’s Privacy Project. “Consumers must have the right to control whether their data is gathered and how it is used. People don’t realize the absolute gold mine of data about their life that exists inside their smartphone,” he added. “There really needs to be an educational process started so that people will begin to understand that.”
Blog Post
France’s privacy watchdog has just fined Google 100,000 euros ($142,000) as a result of the Internet giant’s Wi-Spy activities. It may not be a lot to a company whose worldwide annual sales are around $25 billion a year, but it’s the biggest fine the regulator has issued.
Press Release
WASHINGTON, DC — Google’s latest privacy breach, gathering children’s social security information on a contest entry form, suggests that the Internet giant did not live up to commitments that prompted the Federal Trade Commission’s Bureau of Consumer Protection to end its inquiry into the Wi-Spy incident, Consumer Watchdog said today.
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Consumer Watchdog has sent a letter to the co-chairmen of the House Privacy Caucus, asking for hearings to inquire why Google solicited partial Social Security numbers for its Doodle 4 Google contest. The two co-chairman of the caucus said later on Thursday that they have agreed to a hearing.
