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Ginger!
Antigen:
--- Quote ---On 2006-01-04 21:11:00, Anonymous wrote:
"Question for you Ginger: If we click on the ads will you get some money. If so I'll get to clicking!"
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Well, theoretically, yes. I'll get paid per click, by whatever formula. But it would violate the agreement I made w/ them if I encouraged it, and that would eliminate all of it right quick.
Also, Google is all about AI. People use them because we find what we're looking for there. They manage that by an ever more sophisticated system that 'reasons' well enough to spot spelling errors and offer likely suggestions and, more importantly, to weed out all maner of attempt to play their system. I know they don't count clicks from my IP. I would imagine that, if they got the same IP hitting the same ad over and over, they'd just ban it. They only get paid if the ads get a return.
If you're gonna try and punk somebody w/ data, don't try the AI guys. That would be like bringing a knife to a gun fight.
When elephants ? ght, it is the grass that suffers.
Kikuyu proverb
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Anonymous:
paying the bills is no excuse for this. you simply suck. get a real fucking job and pay the bills so you can continue your canned fame
Antigen:
Clandestine FBI Google Tap Yields Somewhat Embarrassing Results
By Mark Motz
"Okay, ONE pic. I don't want to come out of this looking like an idiot!"
WASHINGTON - Mountain View-based Google has recently refused to comply with a White House subpoena first issued last summer, prompting U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales this week to ask a federal judge in San Jose for an order to hand over the requested records.
The government wants a list of all requests entered into Google's search engine during an unspecified single week ? a breakdown that could conceivably span tens of millions of queries. In addition, it seeks 1 million randomly selected Web addresses from various Google databases.
Unknown to millions of unwary browsers, the FBI had already taken "samplings" of Google search queries in 2004, and the results were "somewhat embarrassing" according to FBI specialist Sid Farkas.
"We did this in an attempt to root out terrorists primarily, and what we found was that 95 percent of all Google queries that we sampled included the keywords 'tits', 'ass', 'blow job', 'blowjob', and 'snowballing'. A lesser, tiny minority referred to searches for online pharmacies, American Idol, free term papers, and at least one request for pipe bomb fabrication. With the exception of the pipe bomb, I'd say we allocated about 10,000 agent hours on porn and plagiarism. It was a lugubrious, time consuming effort, not to mention a bit embarrassing, to say the least."
IP analysis of random samples of Google queries by the FBI traced several especially bawdy requests to "the 3rd floor of our downtown Chicago office, and the entire floor of the entire House of Representatives, congressional page dormatories included."
http://www.smthop.com/articles1details.asp?newsnum=752
Our government is the potent, the omnipresent teacher. For good or for ill it teaches the whole people by example. Crime is contageous. If the government becomes the lawbreaker, it breeds contempt for law, it invites every man to become a law unto himself; it invites anarchy.
U.S. Justice Brandeis (1856-1941)
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Antigen:
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/business/ ... cords.html
Friday, January 20, 2006 · Last updated 2:47 a.m. PT
Google rebuffs feds on search requests
By MICHAEL LIEDTKE
AP BUSINESS WRITER
Google CEO Larry Page introduces Google Talk Beta, a free global online instant messaging and talk software application Jan. 6, 2006, at the Consumer Electronics Show, CES, in a Las Vegas file photo. Google Inc. rebuffs the Bush administration's request, in a porn probe, for a broad range of information from the search engine leader's massive databases. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes, File)
SAN FRANCISCO -- Google Inc. is rebuffing the Bush administration's demand for a peek at what millions of people have been looking up on the Internet's leading search engine - a request that underscores the potential for online databases to become tools for government surveillance.
Mountain View-based Google has refused to comply with a White House subpoena first issued last summer, prompting U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales this week to ask a federal judge in San Jose for an order to hand over the requested records.
The government wants a list all requests entered into Google's search engine during an unspecified single week - a breakdown that could conceivably span tens of millions of queries. In addition, it seeks 1 million randomly selected Web addresses from various Google databases.
In court papers that the San Jose Mercury News reported on after seeing them Wednesday, the Bush administration depicts the information as vital in its effort to restore online child protection laws that have been struck down by the U.S. Supreme Court.
Yahoo Inc., which runs the Internet's second-most used search engine behind Google, confirmed Thursday that it had complied with a similar government subpoena.
Although the government says it isn't seeking any data that ties personal information to search requests, the subpoena still raises serious privacy concerns, experts said. Those worries have been magnified by recent revelations that the White House authorized eavesdropping on civilian communications after the Sept. 11 attacks without obtaining court approval.
"Search engines now play such an important part in our daily lives that many people probably contact Google more often than they do their own mother," said Thomas Burke, a San Francisco attorney who has handled several prominent cases involving privacy issues.
"Just as most people would be upset if the government wanted to know how much you called your mother and what you talked about, they should be upset about this, too."
The content of search request sometimes contain information about the person making the query.
For instance, it's not unusual for search requests to include names, medical profiles or Social Security information, said Pam Dixon, executive director for the World Privacy Forum.
"This is exactly the kind of thing we have been worrying about with search engines for some time," Dixon said. "Google should be commended for fighting this."
Every other search engine served similar subpoenas by the Bush administration has complied so far, according to court documents. The cooperating search engines weren't identified.
Sunnyvale, Calif.-based Yahoo stressed that it didn't reveal any personal information. "We are rigorous defenders of our users' privacy," Yahoo spokeswoman Mary Osako said Thursday. "In our opinion, this is not a privacy issue."
Microsoft Corp. MSN, the No. 3 search engine, declined to say whether it even received a similar subpoena. "MSN works closely with law enforcement officials worldwide to assist them when requested," the company said in a statement.
As the Internet's dominant search engine, Google has built up a valuable storehouse of information that "makes it a very attractive target for law enforcement," said Chris Hoofnagle, senior counsel for the Electronic Privacy Information Center.
The Department of Justice argues that Google's cooperation is essential in its effort to simulate how people navigate the Web.
In a separate case in Pennsylvania, the Bush administration is trying to prove that Internet filters don't do an adequate job of preventing children from accessing online pornography and other objectionable destinations.
Obtaining the subpoenaed information from Google "would assist the government in its efforts to understand the behavior of current Web users, (and) to estimate how often Web users encounter harmful-to-minors material in the course of their searches," the Justice Department wrote in a brief filed Wednesday
Google - whose motto when it went public in 2004 was "do no evil" - contends that submitting to the subpoena would represent a betrayal to its users, even if all personal information is stripped from the search terms sought by the government.
"Google's acceding to the request would suggest that it is willing to reveal information about those who use its services. This is not a perception that Google can accept," company attorney Ashok Ramani wrote in a letter included in the government's filing.
Complying with the subpoena also wound threaten to expose some of Google's "crown-jewel trade secrets," Ramani wrote. Google is particularly concerned that the information could be used to deduce the size of its index and how many computers it uses to crunch the requests.
"This information would be highly valuable to competitors or miscreants seeking to harm Google's business," Ramani wrote.
Dixon is hoping Google's battle with the government reminds people to be careful how they interact with search engines.
"When you are looking at that blank search box, you should remember that what you fill can come back to haunt you unless you take precautions," she said.
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On the Web:
http://www.worldprivacyforum.org
Electronic Privacy Information Center: http://www.epic.org
Man will never be free until the last king is strangled with the entrails of the last priest.
--Denis Diderot, French encyclopedist
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Antigen:
http://www.news.com/
FAQ: What does the Google subpoena mean?
By Declan McCullagh
http://news.com.com/FAQ+What+does+the+G ... 29042.html
Story last modified Fri Jan 20 04:00:00 PST 2006
Preparing to defend a controversial Internet pornography law in court, the Justice Department has demanded search logs from Google, Microsoft, Yahoo and America Online.
The department asked the search giants to hand over millions of records involving what search terms people have used on the sites and what Web sites are accessible via the search engines.
On one level, the situation involves a straightforward question of whether the department's demands are too onerous and therefore not permitted under federal law. On another, the dispute raises novel questions about search engines' privacy protections and the relationship that four tech giants have with the federal government.
What does it all mean, and what happens next? Read on.
Q: What is the Justice Department demanding from search engines?
A: Federal prosecutors have asked Google, Microsoft, Yahoo and America Online to turn over two types of data: logs showing search terms used by people, and a list of Web sites indexed by the companies' search engines.
Q: Which companies have complied?
The Justice Department isn't talking, at least not yet. Google has opposed the request. Yahoo and AOL have acknowledged complying, saying that they went along with the government's request but did not turn over personally identifiable information. At the time this was written, Microsoft was refusing to say anything, but the ACLU has confirmed that the company did comply.
Q: What information was turned over?
We don't know. The Justice Department initially demanded that the four companies divulge "all URLs that are available to be located through a query on your company's search engine as of July 31, 2005." The subpoena also asked for "all queries that have been entered on your company's search engine between June 1, 2005 and July 31, 2005, inclusive."
But at least when trying to negotiate with Google, the Justice Department eventually narrowed that request to a "random sample of 1 million URLs" and "copies of the text of each search string entered onto Google's search engine over a 1-week period."
Q: So we don't know whether Microsoft, Yahoo and AOL went along with the initial request, or whether they negotiated a better deal?
Exactly. We just don't know, at least not yet, and they're not providing details.
AOL came the closest, saying it turned over a list of "aggregate and anonymous search terms, and not results, from a roughly 1-day period." But it refused to elaborate.
Q: Is there any law preventing a company from talking to the press?
Nope. If they chose, they could disclose all the negotiations that took place, release the correspondence they exchanged with prosecutors and so on. It's a little odd that they're being so tight-lipped.
Or they could have done what Google did and fought the Justice Department in court.
Q: I used those search engines in June and July. Should I be worried about my privacy?
It depends. If you typed in search terms that you consider to be private or confidential, you should be concerned. Such terms might include personal information about you, such as your name or street address.
But what's important to note is that the Justice Department has not been asking for any information that would link those search terms to your identity. It hasn't requested Internet Protocol addresses.
So if you typed in search terms indicating that you, say, have a healthy interest in marijuana cultivation, the data turned over won't implicate you.
Q: The subpoena came from the Justice Department's civil division. Will the attorneys there share the data with their colleagues at the department's criminal division or the FBI?
No law would appear to prohibit them from doing so. A protective order does say that only Justice Department attorneys "who have a need" for the information may receive it.
If the disclosed search logs show evidence of criminal activity, that language may be vague enough to let prosecutors return with a second subpoena to demand the identification of one or more Internet addresses linked with those search terms. Terror-related searches are another likely area of information-sharing--President Bush likes to talk about how "law enforcement officers should not be denied vital information their own colleagues already have."
There has, however, been no evidence that the Justice Department has or has not done this to date.
Q: So the Justice Department could end up using it in a prosecution?
Tim Wu, a law professor at Columbia University, says it may be fair game.
"That's one of the biggest questions in evidence law," Wu says. "It's like if you subpoena a book for another reason, and you find a murder note in it. Can you use it as evidence?"
If the records are in the hands of a third party such as a search engine, Wu says, "generally speaking they can use it to find out about other crimes."
Q: What does the Justice Department plan to do with this data, anyway?
A declaration (click here for PDF) by Philip Stark, a professor of statistics at the University of California at Berkeley, sheds some light on this.
Stark says he has been "involved in conversations" with attorneys and engineers at the companies targeted by the Justice Department to find "practical approaches to sampling their databases of URLs and user queries."
The point of the exercise, Stark said, is to evaluate "how often Web users" encounter pornographic material online, and "to measure the effectiveness of filters in screening those materials."
Q: Who cares about filtering software's effectiveness, anyway?
The Bush administration, for one. It's trying to defend a 1998 law called the Child Online Protection Act before a Philadelphia judge in a trial expected to begin in October.
In other news:
Feds seek millions of search records
Special report: Culture shock in the desert
Newsmaker: Defender of the GPL
Digital music spins new sales approach
Images: Where in the Google Earth are we?
When the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in the COPA case in June 2004, the majority voted to send it back down to the lower court for a full trial. That would, the majority said, "allow the parties to update and supplement the factual record to reflect current technological realities."
That's what the Justice Department aims to do--by arguing in court that filtering software is not a realistic alternative to a federal criminal law because the concept of filtering is flawed and unworkable in practice.
Q: Are my search terms private?
If they're unlinked from your identity, and just part of a list of anonymous searches scrolling across a screen, the privacy concerns are minimized.
Google even displays a list of live search terms on a screen that visitors can view in its Silicon Valley headquarters. That's probably one reason why the company's lawyers have been careful not to raise privacy arguments.
Instead, in a letter dated Oct. 10, 2005, Google lawyer Ashok Ramani objected to the Justice Department's request on the grounds that it could disclose trade secrets and was "overbroad, unduly burdensome, vague and intended to harass."
Q: Then why are privacy groups complaining? Your article includes I-am-outraged statements from the Electronic Privacy Information Center and the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
There are probably a few reasons. First, they'd say, private companies should not serve as convenient information repositories for trial attorneys hoping to win court cases. Second, it's not clear where this information will end up, and how far the protective order stretches.
Third, they simply believe that search engine companies are collecting too much information about their users. Google, Yahoo, AOL and Microsoft set cookies, collect personal information, and retain permanent logs that could be used to create a kind of dossier about a person's search habits.
Deleting cookies is one option. So is preventing your browser from accepting them in the first place. The Firefox browser, for instance, lets you block certain sites so they'll never set cookies.
Q: What will happen next?
The ball's in Google's court. The company will have to respond to the Justice Department's request, and then a federal judge in San Jose, Calif., will rule on the matter. Appeals are also a possibility.
Q: Will there be any political fallout?
Well, the U.S. Congress is controlled by Republicans, and the Bush administration made the request, so the political math is pretty simple. It would probably take more evidence of privacy invasion or wrongdoing for congressional Republicans to do anything substantial.
But the Democrats may. Sen. Daniel Inouye, a Democrat from Hawaii, on Thursday asked the Justice Department about this topic during a Senate hearing.
"On the Google case, what is your reaction to Google's position that (the Justice Department's request) is an invasion of their privacy?" Inouye asked. The Justice Department representative, Deputy Assistant Attorney General Laura Parsky, declined to comment.
Q: This law that the Justice Department is defending talks about "child protection." Is that related to child pornography?
No. Child pornography is already illegal, and the ACLU is not challenging that law in this case. Some of the initial news reports were wrong.
The Child Online Protection Act makes it a crime for a commercial Web site to post material that some jurors might find "harmful" if a minor stumbled across it.
That vague requirement has alarmed mainstream Web publishers and civil liberties groups, which have supported the ACLU's lawsuit. Plaintiffs in the COPA case include the American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression, Salon.com, ObGyn.net, Philadelphia Gay News and the Internet Content Coalition. Founding members of the now-defunct Internet Content Coalition included CNET Networks (publisher of News.com), Adobe, Reuters New Media, Sony Online and the New York Times.
Q: What material might be viewed as "harmful to minors?"
The 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals looked into this when ruling the law was unconstitutional based on preliminary evidence (a full trial is scheduled for this fall).
The judges said that even portions of a "collection of Renaissance artwork" could be viewed as harmful to minors if a prosecutor was sufficiently zealous.
"Thus, in our opinion, the act, which proscribes publication of material harmful to minors, is not narrowly tailored to serve the government's stated purpose in protecting minors from such material," the judges said. (Click here for PDF).
Q: How long does Google have to respond to the government's motion in federal court?
In general, the defendant would have two weeks to reply and then the government would have one week for its response. This is an unusual case, however, because no hearing has been set. So the deadlines may be extended.
Q: Are my search results normally disclosed?
Yes, though generally in the context of "most popular search terms" totals. SearchEngineWatch.com has a long list of examples. Dogpile actually lets you review live search terms of the type that the Justice Department also wants to see.
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Religion is comparable to a childhood neurosis.
--Sigmund Freud, Austrian-born psychologist
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