Google's automatic email-scanning tech has been hard at work -- toil which has now resulted in the arrest of a man who had been looking at sexually explicit images of children.
After discovering images, Google reported the Texan man who was already a registered sex offender to the National Centre for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC), Khou.com reports. The Centre proceeded to inform the police who acquired a warrant and upon searching the man's other devices discovered more incriminating images and messages.
In case you weren't aware or had totally forgotten that Google was scanning your emails for evidence, let's just take a moment to acquaint -- or reacquaint -- ourselves with the updated terms of service Google announced earlier this year. In April Google added the following sentences to its privacy policy to make it clear that all of your content -- and that includes anything you upload -- is fair game for scanning:
"Our automated systems analyse your content (including emails) to provide you personally relevant product features, such as customised search results, tailored advertising, and spam and malware detection. This analysis occurs as the content is sent, received, and when it is stored."
Google chairman Eric Schmidt spoke out late last year to emphasise the effort that the company was putting into preventing the spread of child abuse images. In June 2013 Google also published a blog post reinforcing its commitment to tackling child exploitation and saying it would take any incriminating evidence to the NCMEC as well as the Internet Watch Foundation. The company uses "hashing" technology to tag known child sexual abuse images, which allows it to identify duplicate images elsewhere. This means that each image gets its own unique identification number so that humans don't have to look at them twice.
"We're in the business of making information widely available, but there's certain 'information' that should never be created or found. We can do a lot to ensure it's not available online -- and that when people try to share this disgusting content they are caught and prosecuted," said Google's Jacqueline Fuller.
While this implied that Google was making sure that people were unable to come across sexually explicit images of children through search, it never quite made it clear where its commitment to preventing the spread of illegal images stopped. Needless to say, Google always had the capability to extend this to its various products, including Gmail and Google Drive, and now we know for sure that it does.
It's likely that this this latest revelation comes as a result of an individual being careless and much illegal activity goes on well beyond Google's reach. Whether or not you agree with Google's attitude towards privacy, at least this sad story serves as a warning to others who may be tempted to do the same.
Source : wired.co.uk
