Tag: google

Pennsylvania High Court Rules Police Can Access Google Searches Without Warrant

The Pennsylvania Supreme Court has a new definition of “reasonable expectation.” According to the justices, it’s no longer reasonable to assume that what you type into Google is yours to keep.

In a decision that reads like a love letter to the surveillance economy, the court ruled that police were within their rights to access a convicted rapist’s search history without a warrant. The reasoning is that everyone knows they’re being watched anyway.

The opinion, issued Tuesday, leaned on the idea that the public has already surrendered its privacy to Silicon Valley.

We obtained a copy of the ruling for you here.

“It is common knowledge that websites, internet-based applications, and internet service providers collect, and then sell, user data,” the court said, as if mass exploitation of personal information had become a civic tradition.

Because that practice is so widely known, the court concluded, users cannot reasonably expect privacy. In other words, if corporations do it first, the government gets a free pass.

The case traces back to a rape and home invasion investigation that had gone cold. In a final effort, police asked Google to identify anyone who searched for the victim’s address the week before the crime. Google obliged. The search came from an IP address linked to John Edward Kurtz, later convicted in the case.

It’s hard to argue with the result; no one’s defending a rapist, but the method drew a line through an already fading concept: digital privacy.

Investigators didn’t start with a suspect; they started with everyone. That’s the quiet power of a “reverse keyword search,” a dragnet that scoops up the thoughts of every user who happens to type a particular phrase.

The justices pointed to Google’s own privacy policy as a kind of consent form. “In the case before us, Google went beyond subtle indicators,” they wrote. “Google expressly informed its users that one should not expect any privacy when using its services.”

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Google and Substack Warn Britain Is Building a Censorship Machine

Major American companies and commentators, including Google and Substack CEO Chris Best, have condemned the United Kingdom’s censorship law, the Online Safety Act (OSA), describing it as a measure that risks censoring lawful speech while failing to make the internet safer for children.

They argue that the law normalizes digital surveillance, restricts open debate, and complicates how global platforms operate in the UK.

Their objections surfaced through The Telegraph, which published essays from Best and from Heritage Foundation researchers John Peluso and Miles Pollard, alongside new reporting on Google’s formal response to an Ofcom consultation.

That consultation, focused on how tech firms should prevent “potentially illegal” material from spreading online, closed in October, with Ofcom releasing the submissions in December.

Google’s filing accused the regulator of promoting rules that would “undermine users’ rights to freedom of expression” by encouraging pre-emptive content suppression.

Ofcom rejected this view, insisting that “nothing in our proposals would require sites and apps to take down legal content.” Yet Google was hardly alone in raising alarms: other American companies and trade groups submitted responses voicing comparable fears about the Act’s scope and implications.

Chris Best wrote that his company initially set out to comply with the new law but quickly discovered it to be far more intrusive than expected. “What I’ve learned is that, in practice, it pushes toward something much darker: a system of mass political censorship unlike anywhere else in the western world,” he said.

Best describes how the OSA effectively forces platforms to classify and filter speech on a constant basis, anticipating what regulators might later deem harmful.

Compliance, he explained, requires “armies of human moderators or AI” to scan journalism, commentary, and even satire for potential risk.

The process, he continued, doesn’t simply remove content but “gates it” behind identity checks or age-verification hurdles that often involve facial scans or ID uploads.

“These measures don’t technically block the content,” Best said, “but they gate it behind steps that prove a hassle at best, and an invasion of privacy at worst.” He warned that this structure discourages readers, reduces visibility for writers, and weakens open cultural exchange.

Best, who emphasized Substack’s commitment to press freedom, said the OSA misdiagnoses the problem of online harm by targeting speech rather than prosecuting actual abuse or criminal behavior.

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Irony Alert: Google Suddenly Champions Free Speech As UK Crushes Online Expression

In a stunning reversal, Google has slammed the UK for threatening to stifle free speech through its aggressive online regulations. This from the company infamous for its own censorship crusades against conservative voices and inconvenient truths. If even Google is raising the alarm, you know the situation in Britain has hit rock bottom.

The move signals a broader culture shift in Big Tech, where woke agendas are crumbling under pressure from free speech advocates. It’s no coincidence this comes after Elon Musk turned Twitter into X, a platform where ideas flow without the heavy hand of ideological gatekeepers.

Google, which has demonetized, shadow-banned, and outright censored content that doesn’t align with leftist narratives, now positions itself as a defender of open discourse, accusing Britain of threatening to stifle free speech in an escalation of US opposition to online safety rules.

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Gmail Explainer: How to Stop Google AI from Snooping Through Your Emails

Google has quietly started accessing Gmail users’ private emails and attachments to train its AI models, requiring manual opt-out to avoid participation. To make the process even trickier, Gmail users have to opt out in two separate places for the change to work. Follow these steps to protect your privacy from Google’s invasive AI endeavors.

Malwarebytes reports that Google has recently implemented changes that enable Gmail to access all private messages and attachments for the purpose of training its AI models. This means that unless users take action to opt out, their emails could be analyzed to improve Google’s AI assistants, such as Smart Compose or AI-generated replies.

The motivation behind this change is Google’s push to enhance Gmail’s features with the company’s Gemini AI, aiming to help users write emails more efficiently and manage their inboxes more effectively. To accomplish this, Google is utilizing real email content, including attachments, to train and refine its AI models. These settings are now reportedly switched on by default, rather than requiring explicit opt-in consent.

As a result, if users do not manually disable these settings, their private messages may be used for AI training without their knowledge. While Google assures strong privacy measures are in place, such as data anonymization and security during the AI training process, those handling sensitive or confidential information may find little comfort in these promises.

To fully opt out of Gmail’s AI training, users must change settings in two separate locations. This article features a guide and images for opting out on desktop, but the selections are very similar if accessing Gmail via the mobile app.

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Google and US government battle over the future of internet advertising

Google will confront the U.S. government’s latest attempt to topple its internet empire in federal court on Friday as a judge considers how to prevent the abusive tactics that culminated in parts of its digital ad network being branded as an illegal monopoly.

The courtroom showdown in Alexandria, Virginia, will pit lawyers from Google and the U.S. Department of Justice against each other in closing proceedings focused on the complex technology that distributes millions of digital ads across the internet each day.

After a lengthy trial last year, U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema ruled in April that pieces of Google’s ad technology had been rigged in a way that made it an illegal monopoly. That set up another 11-day trial earlier this fall to help Brinkema determine how to remedy its anti-competitive practices.

Friday’s closing arguments will give both Google and the Justice Department a final chance to sway Brinkema before she issues a ruling that probably won’t come until early next year.

The Justice Department wants Brinkema to force Google to sell some of the ad technology that it has spent nearly 20 years assembling, contending a breakup is the only way to rein in a company that the agency’s lawyers condemned as a “recidivist monopolist” in filings leading up to Friday’s hearing.

The condemnation refers not only to Google’s practices in digital advertising but also to the illegal monopoly that it unleashed through its dominant search engine. Federal prosecutors also sought a breakup in the search monopoly case, but the judge handling that issue rejected a proposal that would have required Google to sell its popular Chrome web browser.

Although Google is still being ordered to make reforms that it’s resisting, the outcome in the search monopoly case has been widely seen as a proverbial slap on the wrist. The belief that Google got off easy in the search case is the main reason the market value of its parent company Alphabet surged by about $950 billion, or 37%, to nearly $3.5 trillion since U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta’s decision came out in early September.

That setback hasn’t discouraged the Justice Department from arguing for a breakup of an ad tech system that handles 55 million requests per second, according to estimates provided by Google in court filings.

The huge volume of digital ads priced and distributed through Google’s technology is one of the main reasons that the company’s lawyers contend it would be too risky to force a dismantling of the intricate system.

“This is technology that absolutely has to keep working for consumers,” Google argues in documents leading up to Friday’s hearing. The company’s lawyers blasted the Justice Department’s proposal as a package of “legally unprecedented and unsupported divestitures.”

Besides arguing that its own proposed changes will bring more price transparency and foster more competition, Google is also citing market upheaval triggered by artificial intelligence as another reason for the judge to proceed cautiously with her decision.

In his decision in the search monopoly case, Mehta reasoned that AI was already posing more competition to Google.

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Google Censored Vaccine Info Long Before COVID — Could It Have Anything to Do With Parent Company Alphabet’s Deep Pharma Ties?

Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, Big Tech companies colluded with the government to silence dissent and criticisms of the lockdowns and a coercive mass vaccination campaign by censoring truthful information that did not align with the political agenda.

The Biden administration’s role in the censorship regime was the subject of a May 2024 congressional report titled “The Censorship-Industrial Complex.”

Three months after that report was released, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg admitted in a letter to Congress that Facebook had censored factual information under pressure from the White House.

In September, Google’s parent company, Alphabet, responded to a congressional subpoena with a letter similarly disclosing how the Biden administration had pressured YouTube, owned by Google, to remove videos that didn’t even violate its content policies.

Alphabet called the practice “unacceptable and wrong” while insisting that it withstood the pressure and enforced only its own policies against “misinformation.”

That defense, however, sidesteps the fact that those content guidelines were created in collusion with the same “health authorities” advancing the authoritarian governance — like the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and World Health Organization (WHO).

The result was that true information was censored while government-sanctioned disinformation was allowed to proliferate unchallenged.

As a United Nations official admitted at a September 2022 World Economic Forum (WEF) meeting, Google was helping government authorities to “own the science” in its internet search results.

In its letter to Congress, Alphabet noted that YouTube’s content policies had since evolved. Tacitly admitting how creators had been silenced for telling the truth, Alphabet promised to restore YouTube channels suspended for content no longer deemed misinformative.

So, Alphabet acknowledged the censorship but tried to absolve itself by blaming the White House and public health authorities.

The truth is that Google’s censorship of health-related content, including inconvenient facts about vaccines, predated COVID-19 and continues to this day. Could that be because Alphabet has its own deep financial ties to the pharmaceutical and biotech industries?

Alphabet’s ties to Big Pharma exist through numerous of its subsidiaries, including Calico, DeepMind, Isomorphic Labs and Verily Life Sciences. In this article, we will focus on the latter of Google’s sister companies.

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Google boss says trillion-dollar AI investment boom has ‘elements of irrationality’

Every company would be affected if the AI bubble were to burst, the head of Google’s parent firm Alphabet has told the BBC.

Speaking exclusively to BBC News, Sundar Pichai said while the growth of artificial intelligence (AI) investment had been an “extraordinary moment”, there was some “irrationality” in the current AI boom.

It comes amid fears in Silicon Valley and beyond of a bubble as the value of AI tech companies has soared in recent months and companies spend big on the burgeoning industry.

Asked whether Google would be immune to the impact of the AI bubble bursting, Mr Pichai said the tech giant could weather that potential storm, but also issued a warning.

“I think no company is going to be immune, including us,” he said.

In a wide-ranging exclusive interview at Google’s California headquarters, he also addressed energy needs, slowing down climate targets, UK investment, the accuracy of his AI models, and the effect of the AI revolution on jobs.

The interview comes as scrutiny on the state of the AI market has never been more intense.

Alphabet shares have doubled in value in seven months to $3.5tn (£2.7tn) as markets have grown more confident in the search giant’s ability to fend off the threat from ChatGPT owner OpenAI.

A particular focus is Alphabet’s development of specialised superchips for AI that compete with Nvidia, run by Jensen Huang, which recently reached a world first $5tn valuation.

As valuations rise, some analysts have expressed scepticism about a complicated web of $1.4tn of deals being done around OpenAI, which is expected to have revenues this year of less than one thousandth of the planned investment.

It has raised fears stock markets are heading for a repeat of the dotcom boom and bust of the late 1990s. This saw the values of early internet companies surge amid a wave of optimism for what was then a new technology, before the bubble burst in early 2000 and many share prices collapsed.

This led to some companies going bust, resulting in job losses. A drop in share prices can also hit the value of people’s savings including their pension funds.

In comments echoing those made by US Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan in 1996, warning of “irrational exuberance” in the market well ahead of the dotcom crash, Mr Pichai said the industry can “overshoot” in investment cycles like this.

“We can look back at the internet right now. There was clearly a lot of excess investment, but none of us would question whether the internet was profound,” he said.

“I expect AI to be the same. So I think it’s both rational and there are elements of irrationality through a moment like this.”

His comments follow a warning from Jamie Dimon, the boss of US bank JP Morgan, who told the BBC last month that investment in AI would pay off, but some of the money poured into the industry would “probably be lost”.

But Mr Pichai said Google’s unique model of owning its own “full stack” of technologies – from chips to YouTube data, to models and frontier science – meant it was in a better position to ride out any AI market turbulence.

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Italian Court Orders Google to Restore Banned Catholic Blog

Google has been compelled by the Tribunale di Imperia to restore Messainlatino.it, a major Italian Catholic website that, as you may remember, the company had abruptly taken down from its Blogger platform in July.

The ruling, issued against Google Ireland Limited, the firm’s European branch, also requires payment of approximately €7,000 (about $8,100) in court costs.

The blog’s editor, Luigi Casalini, filed legal action after Google deleted the site without warning, claiming a violation of its “hate speech” rules.

The company’s notification consisted of a short, generic email and provided no explanation or chance to appeal.

For Casalini, whose publication had accumulated over 22,000 articles since 2008 and reached around one million monthly readers, the removal appeared to be less a matter of policy enforcement and more an attempt to silence dissenting religious opinion.

Messainlatino.it was well known for covering issues surrounding traditional Catholic liturgy and had been cited by major outlets.

Following Google’s action, questions were raised in both the European Parliament and Italy’s Chamber of Deputies.

Legislators noted that the deletion “raises serious questions about the respect for freedom of expression, speech and religion” as guaranteed by Article 11 of the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights and Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights.

They also pointed to the Digital Services Act (DSA), which, despite being a censorship law, obliges platforms to apply their moderation policies with “due regard” for fundamental rights.

Casalini’s legal case focused on that provision. He argued that Google’s decision breached Article 14 of the DSA, which calls for a balance between policy enforcement and the user’s right to free expression.

As Casalini stated to LifeSiteNews, “Google acted in this way in violation of the Digital Services Act.”

Google responded through five lawyers based in Milan. The company claimed that an interview with Bishop Joseph Strickland, who opposed the ordination of women as deacons, violated its hate speech policy.

When the defense team countered that the post merely reported the bishop’s words and contained no discriminatory content, Google’s attorneys maintained in court documents that “it does not matter the source, more or less authoritative (bishop, Pontiff) of the post, if it violates the Policy.”

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Google Sued For Allegedly Using Gemini AI Tool To Track Users’ Private Communications

Google LLC is accused in a civil lawsuit of using its artificial intelligence program Gemini to collect data on users’ private communications in Gmail as well as Google’s instant messaging and video conference programs.

Until around Oct. 10, the Gemini AI assistant required the user to deliberately opt into its feature. After that date, the feature was allegedly “secretly” turned on by Google for all its users’ Gmail, Chat, and Meet accounts by default, enabling AI to track its users’ private data in those platforms “without the users’ knowledge or consent,” according to the complaint filed Nov. 11 in federal court in San Jose.

The class action lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, alleging that Google is violating the California Invasion of Privacy Act, a 1967 law that prohibits surreptitious wiretapping and recording of confidential communications without the consent of all parties involved.

Although Google provides a way for users to turn off the feature, it requires users to look for it in the privacy settings to deactivate it, despite never having agreed to it in the first place, the complaint said.

The AI feature is categorized in “Google Workspace smart features” in Google settings. Once turned on, it means the user consents to the program using “Workspace content and activity” across Workspace or in other Google products.

When the feature is turned on, Gemini can “scan, read, and analyze every email (and email attachment), message, and conversation on those services,” according to the complaint.

Technology writer Ruben Circelli wrote in a PCMag article that Gemini is “downright creepy” in diving deep into his personal history, analyzing 16 years’ worth of emails after he signed up for a more advanced pro feature.

In a series of tests by Circelli, Gemini told him one of his character flaws and even knew who his first crush was in elementary school.

“This invasion of privacy wasn’t just disconcerting, though; it was unexpected,” Circelli wrote.

“Google didn’t explain what this integration would do before I signed up for its AI Pro plan, nor did it give me a way to opt out at the start.”

The Epoch Times reached out to Google for comment, but did not receive an immediate response.

“We do not use your Workspace data to train or improve the underlying generative AI and large language models that power Gemini, Search, and other systems outside of Workspace without permission,” the company has stated.

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Google Softens Planned Android Sideloading Ban but Keeps Developer ID Verification

Google is slightly relaxing its controversial new Android policy on sideloading, but the shift does little to change its overall direction.

The company confirmed that it will still move ahead with mandatory developer identity verification for nearly all apps while introducing a limited “advanced flow” that lets “experienced users” continue installing software from outside the Play Store.

According to Google, the new system will feature multiple security warnings meant to deter casual users from downloading unverified apps.

“It will include clear warnings to ensure users fully understand the risks involved, but ultimately, it puts the choice in their hands,” the company said.

The process is still being developed, with feedback now underway before finalization in the coming months.

The adjustment follows backlash from developers and Android fans who criticized Google’s original plan to block apps created by unverified developers starting next year.

The community argued that the move would effectively close off Android’s long-standing openness by removing the ability to install software freely.

Despite the new language, Google’s latest policy maintains the same structure.

Developer ID verification will still be required for nearly all app distribution.

Only students and hobbyists will be allowed to share apps with a limited number of devices without providing identification, and businesses deploying internal software will remain exempt.

For everyone else, verification and a $25 registration fee will be mandatory, including for apps distributed outside Google Play. Previously, there was no charge for independent distribution.

The rollout schedule remains the same. Developers who distribute apps outside the Play Store began receiving early-access invitations on November 3, while Play Store developers will get theirs starting November 25.

The early-access period runs through March 2026, after which the verification program will open to all developers. The rules take effect in Brazil, Indonesia, Singapore, and Thailand in September 2026, and globally in 2027.

Google maintains that the new requirements are about security, not control.

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