The Death of Scroogle + Google Privacy Policy Change + March 8th Internet shutdown = ?

[Cyprium]

Our favorite search engine Scroogle.org has had it's troubles in the past. Every so often Google created temporary road blocks for the private search engine. More than once we feared it was never going to work again but it managed to bypass those obstacles and come back to life.

 

Something a little different is afoot this time. For a month or so we had scroogle's servers being randomly blocked by Google who identitifed them as bots. Scroogle worked and then didn't randomly during that time. Then came Google's privacy policy consolidation...all Google affiliate sites and services had their respective privacy policies ditched in favor of one umbrella policy. A likely connection? I figure there just might be....

 

Google might feel its about time to give people no quarter when it comes to ducking the eye of Big Brother. Their new policy will help to consolidate information from its users over all of its affiliates. A better database to track you in. Having any alternative seach engines that can bypass the scrutiny is bothersome to Google i'm sure. Will we see all alternative, private search engines fall one by one now? I hope not...but Scroogle is not just broken...it's MIA. The servers no longer even seem to exist.

 

Anyway...lets keep pulling what we have out of the arsenal. Here's some things to check out...

 

http://anonymouse.org/anonwww.html - anonymous email sending, web surfing and newsgroup posting

 

http://www.historycommons.org/ - "The website is a tool for open-content participatory journalism. It allows people to investigate important issues by providing a space where people can collaborate on the documentation of past and current events, as well as the entities associated with those events. The website can be used to investigate topics at the local, regional, or global level. The data is displayed on the website in the form of dynamic timelines and entity profiles, and is exportable into XML so it can be shared with others for non-commercial purposes."

 

http://duckduckgo.com/ - private search engine

 

http://yippy.com/ - private search engine

 

Now....if you all recall that there is a rumor of an FBI shutdown of internet servers on March 8...what do you think? Are we looking at some correlating events and if so...is it going to seriously threaten our ability to research and think freely on the web?

 

 

 

[Betty]

I am so glad to see you here Tristan.  I was afraid you had been "shutdown".  I want to report that the wifi is better upstairs, but now always.,  I find if  I pray about my time and what I post especially and "ask permission' for my time and my words, it goes smoother.  Go figure.  Works better than whistling dixie for sure.

[Prodigal Son]

Excerpts from Google's new Privacy Policy. If you use any Google affiliates and have not read these things, you may want to be forewarned.

"We collect information in two ways:

 

    Information you give us. For example, many of our services require you to sign up for a Google Account. When you do, we’ll ask for personal information, like your name, email address, telephone number or credit card. If you want to take full advantage of the sharing features we offer, we might also ask you to create a publicly visible Google Profile, which may include your name and photo.

 

    Information we get from your use of our services. We may collect information about the services that you use and how you use them, like when you visit a website that uses our advertising services or you view and interact with our ads and content. This information includes:

 

        Device information

 

        We may collect device-specific information (such as your hardware model, operating system version, unique device identifiers, and mobile network information including phone number). Google may associate your device identifiers or phone number with your Google Account....

 

Log information

 

When you use our services or view content provided by Google, we may automatically collect and store certain information in server logs. This may include:

 

    details of how you used our service, such as your search queries.
    telephony log information like your phone number, calling-party number, forwarding numbers, time and date of calls, duration of calls, SMS routing information and types of calls.
    Internet protocol address....

 

Location information

 

When you use a location-enabled Google service, we may collect and process information about your actual location, like GPS signals sent by a mobile device. We may also use various technologies to determine location, such as sensor data from your device that may, for example, provide information on nearby Wi-Fi access points and cell towers....

 

Where we can provide information access and correction, we will do so for free, except where it would require a disproportionate effort. We aim to maintain our services in a manner that protects information from accidental or malicious destruction. Because of this, after you delete information from our services, we may not immediately delete residual copies from our active servers and may not remove information from our backup systems....

 

We will share personal information with companies, organizations or individuals outside of Google if we have a good-faith belief that access, use, preservation or disclosure of the information is reasonably necessary to:

 

    meet any applicable law, regulation, legal process or enforceable governmental request.
    enforce applicable Terms of Service, including investigation of potential violations.
    detect, prevent, or otherwise address fraud, security or technical issues.
    protect against harm to the rights, property or safety of Google, our users or the public as required or permitted by law."

 

http://www.google.com/intl/en/policies/privacy/

 

[Kathy]

Wow! That is A Lot of information that is "gathered and stored"!

[Bean]

"We may collect device-specific information (such as your hardware model, operating system version, unique device identifiers, and mobile network information including phone number)."

Notice those bold items are following the phrases Google "may collect" and "such as".. but perhaps it would have been more specific for Google to use the phrase "such as, but not limited to," instead.

It was previously suspected that entities, hypothetically such as (but not limited to) Google, not only collected, stored and shared individual users' sensitive data, but that those entities also possessed the abilities to remotely access and operate those users' computers to perform functions such as (but not limited to) introducing non-user information within those systems.

When people allow Google to collect "device-specific information" (such as your hardware model, operating system version, unique device identifier" and whatever else they neglected to mention that they "may collect", then those people are allowing Google to remotely access and operate their computers, if Google so chose, at any time, and perform actions such as, but not limited to, depositing data, legitimate or otherwise.

The ramifications of such activity, especially since both the entity and the user are legally bound by the Terms (including the obligation of the entity to report any "incidents" to the proper authorities) could be pretty horrible, and such and event hopefully would never happen - but it could.

[Cyprium]

"FBI won't cut off your Internet for another 4 months
Judge grants extension to keep infected servers running until machines cleaned up

 

All those computer users whose Internet access was about to be cut off by the FBI can breathe a bit easier.

 

Late yesterday (March 5), federal Judge Denise Cote granted the federal government another 120 days to keep running several Domain Name System servers that were keeping hundreds of thousands, and possibly millions, of infected computers online.

 

The servers had been due to be shut off this coming Thursday, March 8, after the previous 120-day mandate given in the original protective order had run out. The new deadline is July 9. "

 

full article: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/46644705/ns/technology_and_science-secu...

[Kathy]

Get It While You Can

 

March 12, 2012
Holly Deyo
On March 8 we linked to an MSNBC article headed FBI Won't Cut Off Your Internet for Another 4 Months, a follow-up to Will the FBI Shut Down My Computer on March 8? Q&A. These two pieces addressed the notice we posted several weeks ago about a major Internet attack coming on that date. In case you thought it was another non-event like Y2K, it's not. This malware worm has infected approximately 4 million PCs, Macs and network routers worldwide redirecting visitors to bogus websites.
The hackers were traced back to Estonia. Estonia? It's not the first country of origin that pops to mind for cyber attacks.
A judge granted the government a 4-month extension for computers and servers to be cleaned of these viruses. Hence, the March 8 date came and went and people thought this was yet another false flag. Because this story has been widely under-reported, it's fallen off radar. However, these Trojans are still a huge concern and the possible repercussion – Internet shutdown – has been delayed to July 9. This is a non-so-subtle reminder about Obama having his hand on the "kill switch".
Because time is usually in short supply around our house, we make the majority of purchases online. Apart from food, clothes and gasoline, we buy nearly everything through the Internet from books to electronics to tools and emergency preparedness supplies to make-up, heirloom seeds, cookware and gifts. On and on the list goes. Even Stan's cologne, which is hard to find, I buy online. It is a time-saver of immeasurable proportion and there's no sales tax – yet. We can't imagine now living without this convenience, no, make that "necessity".
If the worse case happens and the Internet is shut down on July 9, think about all the things you normally buy online or are considering and make those purchases now. Heads up.

 

http://standeyo.com/NEWS/12_Sci_Tech/120312.Internet.shutdown.html

[Prodigal Son]

Maybe the New Scroogle -

 

Gibiru.com search engine is, like Scroogle used to be, based on Google search results but without the tracking of Google.

 

The name and logo of the search engine is enough to give me some skeptical feelings but read their claims and decide for yourself:

 

http://gibiru.com/index.php/2012-03-07-06-37-31

 

"Gibiru - Promoting a Free Uncensored Internet

 

Recently, the NSA has had major publishers remove "Alternative News" sites from search results that contain content on on the War in Iraq, Afghanistan and even Iran, US diplomatic and political scandals (like Wikileaks notorious cables), UFOs, even astro physics. Unfortunately, the government , major publishers and search engines are foreced to work closely to chill Internet discourse. America OnLine, Microsoft, Yahoo and others are slowly turning the Internet into an information superhighway dominated by barricades, toll booths, off-ramps that lead to dead ends and track you everywhere. This censorship is accomplished by geo-location filtering: the restriction or modifying of web content based on the geographical region of the user. In addition to countries, such filtering can now be implemented for states, cities, and even individual IP addresses.

 

Anonymity and Private Browsing

 

Gibiru Offers Users Private Browsing of Uncensored Seach Results. Gibiru is presently based on modified Google Search algorithm that limits tracking of your internet behavior and privacy thus removing behavioral search result filtering and censoring so that you get natural untargeted search results. Gibiru offers different levels of privacy depending on the browser that you use. The following table explains the difference in Privacy a Gibiru user can expect depending on the browser you are using. For Maximum Privacy Gibiru recommends Safari. We seriously discourage the Use of Chrome since it is a product developed by Google and the NSA. Protect Your Browsing Freedom and Set Gibiru as your Homepage."