Eric Schmidt: If You Don't Want To Use Your Real Name, Don't Use Google+

[frontpage]

Eric Schmidt: If You Don’t Want To Use Your Real Name, Don’t Use Google+

Google+ was meant to be an identity service, Google Chairman Eric Schmidt said this weekend, shedding some light on Google’s reasoning behind Google+’s controversial real-name policy.

[mashable.com...]

[Maurice]

@wheel amen - I bet every one in google has given up on getting a pay rise thats suposedly linkd to googles social performance

[HuskyPup]

<slightly off topic but possibly relevant to some>

So Huskypup, you now have an e-commerce website without your address on it? No telephone number as well?

Nope, we are not an e-commerce site, we are the original manufacturer B2B full container load only producer in several key supply countries such as Brazil, China, India, Italy, Spain, Turkey and so on.

We were known globally by our entire industry way before the www came along. The problem that has been more prevalent since 2008 is that seemingly more buyers are trying to by-pass their tradtional wholesale suppliers yet still purchase in what we would describe as small quantities.

In Europe and North America this is not a problem for us since we can direct people immediately to wholesale stockists there and we still keep their full contact details on the sites however for the main factory sites it has become a royal PITA hence the removal of specific details of some of them.

Genuine trade enquiries are not a problem, Joe Public with his funky DIY job in the expanding Asian market are an issue for us.

I hope that explains why I/we/the company does not need our contact information spreading even more.

<O/T>

[wheel]

@wheel amen - I bet every one in google has given up on getting a pay rise thats suposedly linkd to googles social performance

Actually, I was pondering this myself just yesterday. Now that Google's a public company, at some point the shareholders are going to revolt over all this nonsense that they do - continued applications that don't make money, flounder and die. We're not there yet, but someday the arguments about company culture will no longer outweigh the need to focus on business practices that make money. Maybe it even takes a change at the management level to make that happen, via a shareholder revolt. I give it 5 years.

[Sgt_Kickaxe]

Aww darned... it looks like I may need to re-tile my roof. I just checked Google maps and can see a missing tile. What's Eric Schmidts home address, I want to check his roof too, he's a busy man.

It's not a far stretch from that to seeing a picture of his daughter/son(if he has one) online and getting a layout of his house to plan an abduction. I'll be able to use his freely given personal information to see if he's home, perhaps pretending to be a wrong number with a quick honk of the car horn to see if I can hear that horn in our conversation. No horn = he's not home... or maybe he likes 4square and I can track him even better.

See where this is leading? One person with bad intentions can make for a very bad day, just ONE person. Google then must record all searches and activities in order to prevent a criminal, scratch that they can't, in order to catch a criminal after the fact. When you make it too easy bad things happen, including needing to make it even easier by collecting more, more, more.

This is the end of discussion for me, Google wants what they want but it's just not in my best interests to parade in front of millions of people unknown to me with everything about me in the wind. No thanks, it's my constitutional right to have an expectation of privacy which Google makes extremely hard to maintain. Now I'm off to fix my roof, I'll wave to you while I'm up there.

[g1smd]

must record all searches and activities in order to prevent a criminal, scratch that they can't

Once they have a database of the pattern of events that criminals used before the crime, they can use that to see who is about to commit a crime.

Once we are all accepting of that, they can use it to predict who will do anything that the "state" or any "organisation" disagrees with.

[mrguy]

Instead of "Minority Report", it will be "Google Says So".

[g1smd]

The trend continues.

Anonymous bloggers to be kicked off scienceblog by National Geographic [scienceblogs.com...]

[wheel]

There's a difference. Nobody cares about Nat. Geographic. That'll just rapid a slow death.

Years ago I ran a forum. We competed against the 'official' industry forum run by the regulatory body. How do you compete against that? You can't.

Oh, unless the industry forum requires real registration - you can't post anonymously. Almost nobody was willing to post even professional information other than anonymously. Their forum withered and died (not just for that reason, but that was a big part of it), we got all the traffic.

For example, if manager A wanted to ask a question about pricing or application of regulation from their peers, they wanted to do so anonymously, not Manager A at Company A. And his peers/competitors that were willing to assist, also would not do so other than anonymously.

The regulatory authority, like Nat. Geographic, also seriously pondered the issue and unilaterally said 'everyone registers in their name'.

There was another site run by a similiar regulatory body that had frequent downtime (I put in great efforts to ensure we were never down) and formally chastised a poster over a post - because they knew who the poster was.

In the end, two dead forums on the industry giants, one little forum run by the community and FOR the community dominated.

People forget that they need to run their business for their customers not for their business. It's common to lose site of that and start making decisions that are in the best interests of the business, or that don't listen to their customers.

And in this case, Google is going to see yet again that they can't force consumers to implement crappy products like Google+. It's another horse dead at the gate. For people that are supposed to be bright, these folks are remarkably slow learners.

[rlange]

wheel wrote:
The AOL 'anonymized' data dump they did years ago and released on the web. Search history alone identified a number of people.

Ah, yes. That's actually not a valid rebuttal to my point about "name alone", though. The one publicly identified individual gave quite a few clues in her searches:

And search by search, click by click, the identity of AOL user No. 4417749 became easier to discern. There are queries for "landscapers in Lilburn, Ga," several people with the last name Arnold and "homes sold in shadow lake subdivision gwinnett county georgia."

Source [nytimes.com]

wheel wrote:
You know they found personal details of Eric Schmidt online just by searching right?

He falls under the "well-known enough" category, wouldn't you agree? Certainly within certain circles that talk about him on the Internet. I suppose the point is that if you don't want people to know anything about you, don't be anybody.

Just from this forum, people know that I don't live in a large city. They know I sell some type of niche product online. They know some general details about my social/family situation. Throw in my name into a search and determining which individual I am is easy. then throw in the fact that I ran for a local political office and they publish personal details online, and you've got my home address and cellphone number. And with my previous ISP, if you did a reverse lookup of my home IP, you got my name - so you could get all this info just from my visiting your site and you checking your logs.

Throw in some other cross connections that could be made, and you end up not just with a unique identity, but a pretty complete picture.

Sure, but most of that doesn't even require a name. You're arguing that people shouldn't post personal details online, which is fine, but others here are simply complaining about requiring your real name.

Again... Your name does not uniquely identify you; all that other stuff does. If you're posting about your personal life in the small town that you live in and which restaurant you just went to, it doesn't matter if you're doing it under an alias. Conversely, if all you're posting about is SEO tips, news, and various other technical matters, your real name is not going to identify you specifically.

--
Ryan

[viralvideowall]

This is all an attempt to eventually require an Internet ID to get on the Internet... yet another way to corral us lowly peasants while the government gets to do whatever they want and live above the law.

Google is the CIA, Google + is more evidence of this fact. Imagine how quickly any one of us would end up in jail if we drove around in a car that took 360 degree photos of the neighborhood.

What Google+, Facebook and Twitter are hoping for is to brainwash everyone into believing this garbage. Use your real name, a real photo of yourself... the next thing you know you'll have to have an ID card with fingerprint and have a criminal background check.

This is all goes against the heart and soul of the Internet.

The Internet would be a better place if Google, Facebook and Twitter would go away. Oh yeah... Bing too.

[wheel]

I gave you two examples, you don't like either example. Eyeroll.

[rlange]

viralvideowall wrote:
Google is the CIA, Google + is more evidence of this fact.

I wondered what happened to all my tinfoil...

wheel wrote:
I gave you two examples, you don't like either example. Eyeroll.

I was talking about apples. You said, "You're wrong about apples." When I asked for clarification, you pointed to oranges. I can't imagine why anyone would find that sort of debate tactic acceptable.

Edit: If you're referring to Eric Schmidt and yourself, well... Eric Schmidt is a fairly prominent person within fields that we're familiar with. You ran for a public office. Mr. Schmidt and yourself have additional concerns, of course, due to your respective situations, but neither of those situations apply to the vast majority of the rest of us.

--
Ryan

[Reno]

This is all an attempt to eventually require an Internet ID to get on the Internet

This is not far fetched at all. We know there is to be an "internet kill switch" included in the cybersecurity bill, so once the populace accepts that the PTB can shut it all down based on their own criteria, it stands to reason that having a required login ID will eventually be part of the plan ~ emphasis below on "any private company" (that means YOU):

"...the bill would also see the creation of a new agency within the Department of Homeland Security, the National Center for Cybersecurity and Communications (NCCC). Any private company reliant on "the Internet, the telephone system, or any other component of the U.S. 'information infrastructure'" would be "subject to command" by the NCCC, and some would be required to engage in "information sharing" with the agency..."

2010 Full Story [huffingtonpost.com]

2011 Followup [cbsnews.com]

....................

[viralvideowall]

@reno Yep... we are screwed. People can joke about tinfoil all they want but the Golden Age of the Internet is over... or will be very soon.

I predict our government will launch a false flag cyber attack against its citizens so they can speed up the process. I'd say that will happen within the next year or two.

[frontpage]

@ rlange

I wondered what happened to all my tinfoil...

You must not do a lot of reading of the newspaper to believe that Google is not involved with intelligence agencies.

Exclusive: Google, CIA Invest in ‘Future’ of Web Monitoring

The investment arms of the CIA and Google are both backing a company that monitors the web in real time — and says it uses that information to predict the future.

The company is called Recorded Future, and it scours tens of thousands of websites, blogs and Twitter accounts to find the relationships between people, organizations, actions and incidents — both present and still-to-come.

Google+ "Just give us your name and make our job easier"

[wired.com...]

Google Earth was formerly "Keyhole". Do a little reading.

In-Q-Tel, a private nonprofit venture funded by the Central Intelligence Agency, today announced a strategic investment in Keyhole Corp., a pioneer of interactive 3D earth visualization.

Google acquired Keyhole Inc. in 2004.

Google to enlist NSA to help it ward off cyberattacks
[washingtonpost.com...]

As an example, there's this hostname that may or may not tell-tale about Google's and US Air Force's Network Operations & Security Centers (NOSCs) URL = nosc-google.nosc.ang.af.mil.

[wheel]

. You ran for a public office. Mr. Schmidt and yourself have additional concerns, of course, due to your respective situations, but neither of those situations apply to the vast majority of the rest of us.

You want an example of everyone on the web? Eric Schmidt should know better, and he was still unhappy with the info. And I'm hardly a public person - I explicitly strive to keep my info private; much more so than the average person. For example, I didn't exactly run for king of the world, I ran for a political seat in a rural area of 5K people. And I had to sign a form that allowed the gov't to publish my info online (I could've declined if I actually was tinfoil hat). This is normal life for everyone, particularly if they're not sensitive to the issue as I am. Regular people likely have more info than me and Schmidt, not less.

I called a guy earlier this year to buy a domain. I started with a throwaway userid the guy had used in an auction, and ended up with the guy's phone number (and his two discrete businesses and business address). And his domains were privacy registered. Didn't help.

The point you're missing is that if Eric Schmidt and I can be found online, anyone can. We're not counter examples, we're the examples that prove the point.

And that's fine if you don't care - the problem is that most people DO care.

[netmeg]

(or at least are starting to)

[wheel]

Yeah, slowly starting to. Some of us have been bleating for a while now. I just saw an article on mainstream media saying youth are now becoming more concerned about privacy.

THis issue could still be Google's Achille's heel.

[nomis5]

Anonymity, its all about anonymity. And that's what many are arguing for here, they don't want to put their name to what they publish on the internet.

Fine, you can cyber bully my daughter or son to bits, destroy their lives for ever and never need to say who you are.

Coward. You want to say something on the internet then do it the same way it was done 20 years ago - do it personally so we can all see who you are without hiding behind anonymity. My local village will tear you apart, quite rightly, if you do that. How can a community impose standards if those who are attacking it do so behind a cloak of anonymity. Make yourself known and stand up for what you say / write.

[Leosghost]

Anonymity, its all about anonymity. And that's what many are arguing for here, they don't want to put their name to what they publish on the internet.

Fine, you can cyber bully my daughter or son to bits, destroy their lives for ever and never need to say who you are.

Coward. You want to say something on the internet then do it the same way it was done 20 years ago - do it personally so we can all see who you are without hiding behind anonymity. My local village will tear you apart, quite rightly, if you do that. How can a community impose standards if those who are attacking it do so behind a cloak of anonymity. Make yourself known and stand up for what you say / write.

from someone whose name really is "nomis5"

( and at the time and date of posting has ( like myself, and very many others here ) no ID or site in their profile ) ;-)

[Lapizuli]

Two sides of the same coin:

"I want anonymity because I don't want to be a victim."

"I want no anonymity because I don't want to be a victim."

Most people don't want not to be accountable; they want to protect THEIR daughters and sons.

There was a fascinating classic old SF story called First Contact by Murray Leinster, expressing a similar dilemma - the desire to trust, but unwillingness to risk being the first one to do so. It was written at a time when society was also going through a period of being forced to deal closely with anonymous strangers, both at home and abroad - 1945.

[Staffa]

Fine, you can cyber bully my daughter or son to bits, destroy their lives for ever and never need to say who you are.

That is exactly why we want anonymity on the internet.
If your daughter or son were to use an alias instead of their real names your local bullies wouldn't know who they are. That is if they then didn't give their identity away by some other foolish means, like replying.

[Reno]

Fine, you can cyber bully

Freedom is not free ~ people die for it, people suffer for it, people put up with morons for it. I wish it wasn't that way, but it seems that's the deal. We can't be safe AND free ~ with freedom comes risk.

I think cyberbullying should be a crime if directed at minors and carried beyond a certain point. I would say that if that point is crossed and if charges are filed, there are ways to track the perpetrator. Personally, I have no problem with that. And when they are found, punish them; and if it's an adult cyberbullying a child, make them register as an offender and make that registration public so people in a community know who they are living near. Fair enough. But don't force millions of people to disclose what they don't want disclosed because one person in one hundred thousand is warped. And believe me, the government would love nothing more than to insist on this, as they whittle away our existing freedoms with every passing day.

................................

[shazam]

Nice discussion. It's good to see a bit of honest dialogue without it being squashed by the google folks running/moderating this site. This is a healthy and welcome change.

The intelligence agencies are of course closely involved with google and have been from the beginning. Google is holding/controlling the largest database ever collected in the history of mankind. It's a given that big brother is going to be intimately involved. They have been very clear about the complete disregard of personal privacy for years.

"If you have something that you don’t want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn’t be doing it in the first place."

I disagree with the common thought in this thread that google+ is destined to failure. The sad fact is, the sheeple are not very smart and generally operate on autopilot. Groups of people have been shown again and again to make terrible decisions that individuals wouldn't have made.

The other factors are obvious. The day will soon come when the "you don't get your cookie if you don't play by our rules" screws start tightening. Open an adwords/adsense etc.. account without first opening a gmail account for an example. They already have shown they have no moral dilemma with reading our gmails.

The other reason is that they are not going to just give up and walk away like they did with 'wave.' This is too much of a spooks wet dream to control a social network like this. The involvement of intelligence agencies and the large investment show that one way or another the masses will be assimilated.

[wheel]

Fine, you can cyber bully my daughter or son to bits, destroy their lives for ever and never need to say who you are.

My kids don't get cyberbullied because I'm in charge of their online activities. it's not other people's responsibilities to babysit your kids while they're on facebook - it's yours.

And frankly, cyberbullying is the least of the concerns you should have if you're not monitoring your kids activities online.

[Leosghost]

More from "the creepy uncle" Eric on the subject of google+
[theregister.co.uk...]

“we could check them, we could give them things …bill them, you know, we could have credit cards and so forth … there are all sorts of reasons.”

“My general rule,” Schmidt said, “is that people have a lot of free time and … there are people who do really evil and wrong things on the Internet, and it would be useful if we had strong identity so we could weed them out.”

This doesn’t mean “eliminating them”, he says: “if we knew their identity was accurate, we could rank them. Think of them like an identity rank.”

[netmeg]

Coward. You want to say something on the internet then do it the same way it was done 20 years ago

As someone who was there and participating in this same exact anonymity discussion OVER TWENTY FIVE YEARS AGO*, I can assure you that it wasn't done any differently twenty years ago than it is now. Some people prefer to be anonymous and some don't. This same exactly discussion crops up every few years, and a bunch of people get all excited, but in the end, as I said above, people will do what people will do. And some folks will always be anonymous, and other folks will always be calling for them to be outed. It couldn't be more repetitive. But somehow, nothing ever really changes.

(There are no Google folks running or moderating this site)

*active participation on public access unix conferencing boards M-Net, Grex, Chinet, Igloo, & The Well; plus heavy activity in all Usenet soc.* groups and a few alt.* groups. In short, I have the history.

[rlange]

wheel wrote:
And that's fine if you don't care - the problem is that most people DO care.

It's not that I don't care about privacy on the Internet; I just recognize that, outside of a handful of special cases, an alias is not the Holy Grail of anonymity.

I'm repeating myself, but if you're already posting personal details online, doing so under an alias isn't what's keeping you anonymous. If you're commenting on the tech industry under your real name and never reveal—or no one else makes available—even the most general information about your location, you're anonymous.

The situation is a lot more complicated than "real name vs. alias".

If it's not clear, my position is that privacy is important, but anonymity (in a vast majority of situations) is not.

--
Ryan

[viggen]

...help me out here, what is the differnce if i open a fake account and call myself on Google + Mr. Joe Smith instead of viggen? How are they going to check if I am really mr. Joe Smith? ID? yeah right ---> [gewalker.blogspot.com...]

[frontpage]

Noticed you ignored the Google and CIA/intelligence community relationship. Silence is thunder. :)