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Google Email Data & Privacy

Gmail users have no ‘reasonable expectation’ that their emails are private, Google says

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By Ishbel Macleod, PR and social media consultant

August 15, 2013 | 2 min read

Google has said in a court ruling that those sending emails to a Gmail account have no ‘reasonable expectation’ that the communications will be confidential.

A class action lawsuit, filed in May, claimed that Google "unlawfully opens up, reads, and acquires the content of people's private email messages".

It said: "Unbeknown to millions of people, on a daily basis and for years, Google has systematically and intentionally crossed the 'creepy line' to read private email messages containing information you don't want anyone to know, and to acquire, collect, or mine valuable information from that mail."

‘Creepy line’ is a quote from Eric Schmidt, Google's executive chairman, who once said: "Google policy is to get right up to the creepy line and not cross it."

Google replied: "Just as a sender of a letter to a business colleague cannot be surprised that the recipient's assistant opens the letter, people who use web-based email today cannot be surprised if their communications are processed by the recipient's ECS [electronic communications service] provider in the course of delivery."

This comes the same week as Microsoft blasted Google in its Scroogled blog, accusing the internet giant of Google violating privacy by “reading every single word of every single email sent to and from Gmail accounts so they can better target you with ads”.

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