From the Webmaster
Over the years we've had numerous visitors to the website ask us for information that is really not pertinent to Circle Sanctuary but very pertinent to website surfing in general. This page is intended as an FAQ of sorts on handling some of the topics that we get asked about which are not Circle-specific but Internet technology specific.

Question: Should I Install Google Desktop or Google Toolbar On My System?
Webmaster: Not If You Value Your Harddisk Privacy!!

Google Desktop
Google technologies have a lot to offer for 'free,' but if you think about it, Google has to be getting something back for doing so, and sometimes what they're getting back from their users, whether their users know this or not, is access to personal and confidential information on your system that you never intended to make available to the world.

Case in point, the Google toolbar "Search Across Computers" feature stores copies of your Word documents, PDFs, spreadsheets and other text-based documents on Google's own servers (to enable searching from the user's computer). Most Google Toolbar users don't realize this before they've installed it. Your tax returns, your love letters, your business records, your financial and medical files, and whatever other documents they can find on your system are all capable of being downloaded and indexed on their servers.

This whole privacy problem arises because the Electronic Communication Privacy Act of 1986, or ECPA, gives only limited privacy protection to emails and other files that are stored with online service providers—much less privacy than the legal protections for the same information when it's on your computer at home. And even that lower level of legal protection could disappear if Google uses your data for marketing purposes. Google says it is not yet scanning the files it copies from your hard drive in order to serve targeted advertising, but it hasn't ruled out the possibility, and Google's current privacy policy appears to allow it.

This Google product highlights a key privacy problem in the digital age. Many Internet innovations involve storing personal files on a service provider's computer, but under outdated laws, consumers who want to use these new technologies have to surrender their privacy rights.

Google Toolbar
With the advanced features enabled, Google's free toolbar for Explorer phones home with every page you surf, and yes, it reads your cookie too. Their privacy policy confesses this, but that's only because Alexa lost a class-action lawsuit when their toolbar did the same thing, and their privacy policy failed to explain this. Worse yet, Google's toolbar updates to new versions quietly, and without asking. This means that if you have the toolbar installed, Google essentially has complete access to your hard disk every time you connect to Google (which may be many times a day). Most software vendors, and even Microsoft, ask if you'd like an updated version. But not Google. Any software that updates automatically presents a massive security risk. Read on brave warrior:

Click here to read about self-updating programs

SO... is that cutesie little toolbar worth having your entire system visible to anyone? We don't mess around here with conspiracy theories. All you have to do to verify the truth behind what's being shared here is head to www.google.com itself and use keywords like

google toolbar problem
google toolbar hack
google toolbar privacy
google toolbar crash
google toolbar invasion
For now, consider these Google utilities an invitation for digital rape: you are highly encouraged to safeguard the confidential files on your harddisk by not installing the Google Desktop or the Google Toolbar. You may also notice a dramatic decrease in your system's performance after installing them. Hey, they're busy doing their own thing while you're doing yours.

The Internet: where 'free, cute and neat' equates to 'invasive, irreversible and disasterous.'

breeze )O(
webmaster@circlesanctuary.org