Techdirt:Why Google's Copy Protection Raises Privacy Issues

Great reporting by TechDirt today. We've talked about Google privacy concerns before, though we didn't realize it crossed into the DRM realm, which we have also generally covered as potentially the biggest stories in 2006.

Techdirt:Why Google's Copy Protection Raises Privacy Issues: "Contributed by Mike on Friday, January 20th, 2006 @ 12:28PM
from the tradeoffs dept.
We've already noted our concerns about Google's decision to create their own copy protection scheme. Beyond the incompatibility issue (which is a big one), it also raises questions about security and privacy, as copy protection schemes, by their very nature have tradeoffs when it comes to privacy and security. Ed Felten is digging into Google's copy protection and believes that the company made some bad choices concerning your privacy. Basically, of the options they had for setting up the copy protection, the one they chose is the one that stores the most amount of information -- basically, who you are, what you're watching and when you're watching it. Because the system calls home to Google every time you want to watch a video you purchased, they basically have a complete record of your viewing habits. While it's nice that, so far, Google is willing to go out of its way to protect the data they have on you from your friendly government officials, that doesn't mean they'll always be able to. It should, however, reinforce the questions people should be asking about just how much they trust Google."