Summary, response, follow up and criticism - We recently ran an article in which we offered an opinion, not just Kurt’s opinion, but an opinion that has been created among our writers, about the security and especially a lack of security in Google’s social network. Of course, it was an editorial opinion, and you may have a different opinion. Google certainly has a different opinion and agreed to give us some of its time today to explain the approach of privacy in Google+. We still do not agree with it in its entirety, but admit that Google has – from its perspective – a case. In  the end, it may all come down to the philosophy of how open your information can be and how paranoid you need to be about your privacy.

One of the advantages of having early access to Google+ is not so much the fact that you can engage with others, simply because there isn’t that much engaging happening right now. However, there is quite a bit you can learn about your personal preferences how a social network should work for you as you can compare Facebook and Google+ side by side in a relatively harmless way: There may be an almost silly volume of interest in Google+, but your exposure on the network is still very limited. If you have read Kurt’s article, you know that we are concerned about Google’s approach to handling privacy (as we are about the protection of privacy in all social networks, by the way.)

Not surprisingly, Google believes it has an approach that is reasonable and appropriate to secure privacy in Google+. Google argues that its social network privacy is much more flexible than the tools provided by its “competition” (we assume that would be Facebook.) Google+ privacy relies on (1) your general Google account settings, (2) the settings in your Google Profile, (3) the use of Circles and (4) your ability to understand your conduct and potential impact of the data you post online.

 

In Google’s words via a statement that was provided to us:

“Google+ is a new project from Google that offers a new way to share with people online — one based on the way relationships work in the real world. We designed Google+ with privacy in mind, including a number of different features that provide you with transparency and choice over who can see what type of information you post or share.

One of the core features of Google+ is Circles, which allow you to share like you do in real life. Instead of treating everyone like a “friend” or a “follower,” in real life you engage with your family in a certain way and with your college buddies in a completely different way. Circles reflects that and allows you to be authentic, so you can share your bar-hopping photos with your college friends, and the latest Alzheimer research that would impact Aunt May with the close family. Circles are for sharing and following, so you can easily filter all the content you receive by circle, and easily share with that circle. The goal is to give you more choice over what you share.”

 

So, Circles are categories you apply to individuals in your network and your decision which information you make available to which circle.

 

Blurring The Lines Between Offline and Online

Google’s Eitan Bencuya explained to me that Google+ somewhat resembles real life and the decisions you will have to make in real life. You share certain information with all people you know, some even with strangers, but there is also information you will only share with select people. Sharing the information with the wrong people will cause inconvenient effects and you will have to deal with it offline – and you will have to deal with it online as well. If we compare this feature to Facebook, it is a clear advantage over the blue team, as you can’t limit status messages, for example, to certain groups in your network on Facebook. If you want separated groups in Facebook, you need multiple accounts. Period.

Google has a case here. It just makes sense.

There is another common sense explanation of a major concern, even if it does not make us entirely happy. The terms of use, which give Google the right and ownership to all content you publish, is a sore spot in many different ways. Bencuya explained that this rule is necessary so Google can publish your shared content on the pages of other users. From this perspective, it is simply an anti-copyright-lawsuit feature that would simply cut down the number of lawsuits Google has to answer. It sounds reasonable, but the rights granted to Google in the terms of service go further (and enable Google to publish your content not just in the places you approve, but any places Google wants to) and the phrasing is beyond my comfort level. Bencuya stressed that Facebook’s the competition’s terms of service are very similar. However, the fact that Facebook has similar terms of service does not necessarily give Google’s terms of service my universal approval.

If you know your way around Google+ (and I would definitely advise every Google+ user to first understand Google+ privacy features before posting anything), you can lock down Google+ quite a bit, even if some features of hiding information are not entirely transparent. Removing pictures of your contacts entirely, for example, would require you to click in a virtual frame around the cluster of images on the left side of the screen and choose the respective removal option. This particular feature never occurred to me until Bencuya pointed it out to me, as I would have expected such an option to be available in the Google+ privacy settings (you cannot disable the display of the images of the individuals of your network in the privacy settings.)

Also, there is no option at this point to hide your name and image in any way on Google+ and your Google Profile page. I don’t quite understand why there is no option that would allow me to configure Google+ or Google Profile in a way that would not show my picture to people I don’t know or to people I don’t want to be exposed to. Also, a concern is that Google+ and Google Profile appear to be linked: Even if your Profile can be theoretically excluded from a Google search and this option has been activated for my personal profile some time ago, I am still searchable and the result now links to my Google+ page. To continue with the comparison, I can continue to hide myself from the public in Facebook, but I can’t do the same for Google+ at this time.

 

Facebook vs. Google+?

I am not quite sure how much sense it makes to compare the privacy features between Facebook and Google+ as both are not perfect and you can hit (unintentional) traps here and there in both cases. The bottom line is that you will have to invest time into the privacy features in both services and I don’t find any purpose in giving either a better or worse privacy rating. However, without comparing both services side-to-side, Google’s approach is clearly as open as possible upfront.

In general, social networks can have three different approaches as far as privacy is concerned. Open, locked down, or a compromise between the two of them. I personally don’t like the open approach as it does not teach the user the kind of control Google wants the user to have. How would you be able to force a user to learn a social network system if you do not teach how to release information? In its current state, Google+ releases all information by default, with the limitation provided by Circles, of course. However, and that is my personal guess, I’d claim that the majority of mainstream users will have a tough time understanding and knowing what information is actually available to whom.

I would be much more comfortable making it a requirement that a user has to actively approve the release of every component of his Google+ page.

To keep the real life example: In real life, you have to learn what information you share with whom and you should have to make it online. Going from a locked down state to an open state resembles real life much better than going from an open approach to limiting information step -by-step.

 

Common Sense

While I understand Google’s case and the reasoning to give people control over the information we share, I would also claim that we have shown often enough that we are not capable of being  responsible enough to not post information we really should not be posting.

Common sense suggests that we should not post damaging information in any way and especially not information that could get us in legal trouble. However, there are countless cases that show that we do just that: We had jurors who posted jury decisions on Facebook before the actual decision was given in court. We had criminals posting location updates. And we know that about 20% of divorces now include information posted on Facebook. Sure, the criminals example, isn’t so bad on a community level, but it shows that some of us are not that smart on an individual level. Common sense in the real world is not equal to common sense on a social network, at least not yet and at least not for a considerable number of Internet users.

Sitting in front of a PC screen still gives us the illusion of a certain anonymity and does not provide us with the same sense of responsibility as if we were in a face-to-face communication. There is a substantial lack of education that is especially problematic for social networks that cater to our desire of being perceived as popular individuals. While Google (and Facebook) can always argue that a social online world is just like the real world, I personally believe that companies with the power and exposure of Google or Facebook have a greater degree of responsibility to protect its users from making mistakes in an environment they may not understand.

In the case of Google+, it would be fairly easy: Lock it down completely, make the privacy option more visible and much more organized. Offer an interactive, hands-on tutorial that explains Google+ features and privacy. Offer a feature such as Google’s Mail Goggles that prevents you from sending emails you may later regret. So, if I answer my question in the headline, I would have to say that being paranoid about privacy is a good thing and a good dose of it may prevent you from doing something stupid on any social network.

For some of us, a locked down Google+ would surely be more inconvenient when we sign up for such a service. It would be counterproductive for Google as it limits revenue generating page views. However, it could keep many of us out of trouble and it could certainly prevent significant unintended emotional, legal and possibly even secondary physical damage as effects.

Google, this is my opinion and constructive feedback to you.

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