Warc, 1 September 2014
LOS ANGELES: When it comes to how organisations handle
personal information, more Americans trust Google and LinkedIn, the social
networking sites, than the US government or Facebook, a new survey has found.
Almost half (47.2%) of Americans trust Google with their
information, nearly a third (32.9%) trust LinkedIn, the professional social
network, but less than a quarter (23.2%) trust the US government, according to
MyLife, the privacy management firm.
Interestingly, although the majority of the survey's 4,000
respondents do not trust any of these three organisations, the US government is
still more trusted than Facebook, which is trusted by just 17.1% of US
consumers.
While these findings may be viewed relatively positively by
Google, the company still came under the spotlight after it emerged that it had
removed an app called Disconnect Mobile from the Android Play app store, the
Wall Street Journal reported.
Disconnect Mobile, which was available in Google's store for
just six days and was downloaded 5,000 times, is a privacy tool that prevents
other apps from collecting data on users.
However, Google informed the San Francisco-based startup
that it violated a rule prohibiting software that "interferes" with
other apps.
Disconnect argued that it had been careful to build its
product according to Google's policies, but suggested these rules are so vague
that it means, in effect, Google can ban any app in its store.
"It's like a Kafka novel – you're getting kicked out or
arrested for reasons you don't even know," said Casey Oppenheim,
co-founder of Disconnect, who also implied that Google didn't want ad-blocking
apps to interfere with its commercial interests.
Data sourced from MyLife, Wall Street Journal; additional
content by Warc staff
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