Media decoder: Google and Mozilla to announce new Privacy features

For the list of companies that intend to offer Web users new ways to control how we collect personal data online, add two largest producers of Internet browsers.

Monday, Mozilla and Google announced the features that enable users to Firefox and Chrome browser to opt-out of line caught by third-party advertisers. The companies made their ads a few weeks after the Federal Trade Commission has published a report that supported a mechanism of "track" that will allow consumers to choose if companies could monitor their online behavior.

In a blog post from Alex Fowler, Mozilla technology and privacy officer, the company presented a proposal for the Firefox browser functionality that would be a signal of third-party advertisers and commercial websites that indicates that a user would not be tracked. The mechanism, called an HTTP header do not trace, would rely on the companies who receive the information for the user agrees not to collect data.

The approach is different from other options currently available to users that rely on cookies or lists generated by the user. In December, Microsoft announced a feature called detection for Internet Explorer 9 that would rely on lists that users create that indicate which sites they don't want to share information with.

"We believe that the approach based on header has the potential to be better for the web in the long run, because it is a clearer and more universal mechanism to opt-out cookies or blacklists," said Mr. Fowler in the blog post.

In a statement, said the President of the Federal Trade Commission, Jon Leibowitz,: "initiative of Mozilla is to be commended. It recognises that consumers want a choice about who is tracking their movements online, and is a first step towards giving consumer choice about who will have access to your data. Also reports that Do not track options are technically feasible. "

Google's approach is based on a browser extension or plug-in, called Keep My Opt-out that work with all versions of its Chrome browser. The extension would allow users to opt-out permanently monitored online by advertisers that already offer opt-out options through self-regulatory programs, such as the Alliance of digital advertising and the Network Advertising Initiative.

In a blog post from Google, the company said it would offer the code for the extension developers on an open source and that you plan to make the functionality available to other browsers in the future.

Regarding the announcement of Google, said a spokesman for F.T.C., "we are pleased that Google is involved in the process, but Mozilla and Microsoft are clearly steps forward".

In a statement, Mike Zaneis, senior vice president and general counsel for the Interactive Advertising Bureau, an organization that supports self-regulation of the sector, said that the feature of Mozilla would require companies to voluntarily recognize consumer choice and that was not yet clear how users can protect their privacy.

"The first analogy that comes to mind is that if a tree falls in the forest and nobody is there to hear it, does it make a sound?  Well, Google has guaranteed an audience to hear the sound of the tree falling, working with established industry, "said Mr. Zaneis.

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Facebook is dealing with the German Privacy Group

Facebook, which has more than 10 million users in Germany, agreed to change his Friend Finder service to let the Germans better lock the possibility to contact people, including users of Facebook-not culled from address books user's e-mail.

Tina Kulow, a spokesman for Facebook in Hamburg, said in Germany would now be advises users that the site may send solicitations of people on their mailing list, you should choose to upload their address books to Friend Finder.

Facebook, the largest social networking site in the world, has the second Internet business based in the United States to change its operations according to the German privacy laws, which allow individual broad control over personal information. Google was the first. Last year, fines, before Google exclude photos Germans left their homes and apartments from his photographic Map Street View before the service went live.

Like Google, Facebook has decided to change its operation after Johannes Caspar, the data protection supervisor in Hamburg, initiated a review of the practices of the company. Violations of privacy German carry penalties up to $ 300,000 or $ 410,000, but the negative publicity can be more damaging.

Mr. Caspar, during an interview, said that his Office had received "many, many complaints" over the past six months by the Germans who had never used Facebook, but were still receive solicitations Facebook because their e-mail addresses were been siphoned from friends.

The issue has taken on the political overtones, with the data protection Commissioner of Federal Germany, Peter Schaar and its consumer protection Minister, Ilse Aigner, criticizing Facebook for neglecting the German privacy laws.

Mr. Caspar opened its administrative review of Facebook last July.

Initially his Office called Facebook Friend Finder service off in Germany. Meetings were held for the past seven months, he said. In the compromise announced Monday, Facebook agreed to explain the characteristics of prominent Friend Finder and educate users on how to limit your ability to access your contacts and store it.

Andrew Noyes, a Facebook spokesman in Washington said that the company hopes to continue to "constructive discussions and dialogue" with Mr. Caspar.

"We are pleased that we have reached a settlement with the Hamburg D.P.A. with regard to the concern of Friend Finder", said Mr. Noyes, referring to the German city authority for data protection.

Mr. Caspar said that his investigation remains open until he could see if the changes ended complaints.

Prosecutors in Hamburg are weighing whether to bring charges against Google for posting of personal home WiFi router. The admission of the company that were collected personal data from unencrypted WiFi router in the world has given rise to many invsestigations, most of which concluded with an apology and warnings on the ground that it was unintentional.

In Germany, after giving residents the opportunity to opt-out in advance, Google has added Street View in 20 cities of last year. The service includes photographs of around eight million households, said Mr. Caspar, but approximately 23 million more households in rural areas and smaller towns were not added to the store.

Google said it had to recruit workers to process all requests from Germans want to remove the photos of their residences from Street View.

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