IP Democracy: Three Cheers for Google

The chilling news today is that the Bush Administration wants Google to divulge search records in an apparent effort to revive and protect the constitutionality of the now-defunct Child Online Protection Act. The Department of Justice has subpoenaed Google asking for a million random Web addresses and records of all Google searches over a one-week period, seemingly as some kind of statistical exercise.

DOJ wants the search data to document how frequently p*rn shows up in web searches. Google, to its great credit, plans to fight the government’s effort, calling the subpoena “overreaching.” The government contends that other search engine companies are more willing to spill the beans.

One privacy advocate, Lauren Weinstein, had this to say about the government’s pursuit of search data:

“It’s interesting and disappointing that other search engines would provide this material. It’s what we’ve been worried about all along. The fact that Google is refusing the subpoena…my initial reaction is three cheers for Google.”

I agree with Good Morning Silicon Valley’s John Paczkowski who says (in an uncharacterically earnest fashion, so different from his usual sardonic wit):

Here’s hoping the company prevails. The release of such records sets a truly unsettling precedent. And if the goverment’s claim that other, unspecified search engines have already agreed to release similar information proves true, we have already lost our footing on a very slippery, very dangerous slope.

Update: Danny Sullivan at Search Engine Watch has this most excellent analysis of the DOJ’s request, why it really doesn’t involve personal data but still isn’t a good idea and how the law that DOJ is seeking to revive doesn’t really do anything about child p*rn. Based on statements from Yahoo and MSN.com, they complied with the same (or similar) subpoena from the feds, but because no personal data was involved, they didn’t view the hand-over of search data as an invasion of privacy.

Posted by Cynthia Brumfield on January 19, 2006 2:12 PM to IP Democracy