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Google recently released its new Desktop 3 beta, and it’s already taking heat. An article from eWeek reports that watchdog organization Electronic Frontier Foundation, or EFF, is warning that the Google application is a serious privacy and security risk.
This is due to the method Desktop 3 uses to store user data on Google servers. Google’s “Search across computers,” allows users to upload various file types from their home computers onto Google servers so they can be accessed from remote locations. EFF believes this system is a bull’s-eye for hackers, and more potential fodder for Government subpoenas.
“If you use the Search Across Computers feature and don’t configure Google Desktop very carefully—and most people won’t—Google will have copies of your tax returns, love letters, business records, financial and medical files, and whatever other text-based documents the Desktop software can index,” said EFF Staff Attorney Kevin Bankston. “The government could then demand these personal files with only a subpoena rather than the search warrant it would need to seize the same things from your home or business, and in many cases you wouldn’t even be notified in time to challenge it.”
