Because Google didn’t learn anything from the Google Buzz privacy debacle, the company has now decided to begin testing the integration of users’ Gmail content into general search results.
So a search for Amazon on Google.com would also bring up a sidebar with e-mails from or related to your Amazon purchases.
Well, that’s all well and good. Until someone’s spouse, significant other, or co-worker unwittingly uses that person’s computer to search for something like “restaurants in Chicago” and up come e-mails about a secret rendezvous at the Rock ‘n’ Roll McDonald’s.
“This is a baby step in a really complicated area,” says the company’s director of product management for universal search about the e-mail results, which Google describes as being in the “limited field trial” stage.
Google hopes to expand the feature to all e-mail providers. It also hopes to similarly integrate all other Google products like Docs, Calendar, Drive.
While we have no problem with making one’s entire Google account searchable from one screen, we think it should be within something like Gmail, where the user already has the expectation of privacy, as opposed to just a Google search that one can do straight from their browser’s nav bar.
For those that have absolutely no problem with their Gmail content possibly showing up in search results, they can opt in at g.co/searchtrial, though we recommend staying far, far away.
Google Adds Personal Gmail Results Into Search
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The post office might start selling more stamps if this becomes the norm.
LOL. Google helps kill e-mail, snail mail on the upswing.
Excellent catch
You should see what the new iPhone is going to do for landlines.
Just wait.
Yeah buddy, landlines will come back… Once we figure out how tot ravel back in time.
You should’ve stopped while you were ahead.
I use and enjoy the search function in Gmail, because it just searches my emails. If I do a web search, I am specifically looking for info from the web, not my emails. This is exactly what those Bing commercials make fun of Google for (though I think they overstate the problem) – getting unwanted results when you search the web for something.
What is it about the unholy alliance between geeks and the marketing department that makes neither capable of understanding why you shouldn’t do some things?
Because code is awesome, and we coders just want to make our giant code monster that we will love and nurture and call George?
You will pet him, and love him . . .
If you leave your browser logged into google, then anyone else who uses the computer has access to your gmail account anyway. Im sure it’s something you could turn off. I might actually find it useful.
that is what I”m thinking…
I’ve been to a lot of people computers..go to gmail.com and their email are there…
This is such a non-issue that I don’t even understand why it is posted here. So, a computer that has you logged into Google will now display your emails in your search… how is this an issue? If there is some privacy concern, this doesn’t really make much difference, since the same results would be available to someone on your logged in computer by going to gmail and searching that.
Doing a google search is the equivalent of spending time in someone living room even though you’re in their house, it’s very common to borrow a PC for a second when someones over. People going into someone gmail or email account is the equivalent of going in their bedroom and digging through their underwear drawer – it doesn’t happen nearly as often and is considered an aggressive act and people have an expectation of privacy that friends don’t go to private addressees. Yes it can still happen but thwe point is this makes it a lot easier, and a lot easier to make mistakes because everything is so public now. Putting it in a public place like that is like having your underwear drawer strewn all over the living room for everyone to see even if they are only peeking in when you’re just answering the door.
The other issue you fail to see is that google wants access to ALL your email accounts even from businesses they do not own.
It’s a non issue to you becuase you don’t understand it.
They have access, but if they’re a trusted family member, they’re probably not snooping. I have email confirmations in my GMail for purchases I’ve made as gifts for my girlfriend. I know she’s not going to open up my email and start reading stuff, but if it pops up when she’s just running a search in Google, it could spoil a surprise.
C’mon Googs, if I want to search my email, I’ll search my email!
I know you want to but don’t try to do my thinking for me.
What we need is a search engine that does searches for what we specify, not what they THINK we are searching for, not what they can sell ads for, etc. Search engines have a history of quickly becoming popular and quickly becoming abandoned. Google will learn this one day.
Exactly.
While I do think this is a really stupid feature that should not be there… I would assume you need to be logged in for it to search your email, which means that person who you let use your computer will just have to go to gmail to read through your emails anyway. This may point it out a bit easier but I would say most people who would have issues with this are idiots to start with
From the original article: Google SVP Amit Singhal said that this personal email search feature wouldn’t necessarily be limited to Gmail. “We are very willing to work with every email provider,”
Oh hells no. We better be able to opt out of this. I certainly do not want to be searching for something with someone looking over my shoulder and it brings up snippets of my yahoo mail. No no no!
Well you can sort of do that now, I can have all my e-mail account integrated into my gmail account. I have my personal e-mail from @***.net directed to my .gmail.com account. I could do the same with a Yahoo account and when I search it will find all e-mails.
Here’s an idea. Go into your settings, and check “Do not use personal results” instead of whinking about how “evil” they are.
Better idea…don’t use Google or gmail.
Yeah! Because, uh, yeah, because!
Would this be prevented by each user of a shared home computer having their own identity / log in?
Remember Google is not evil!
Seriously, Google said it right there in the quote, baby steps. Get people used to this feature and then expand it into other areas, like the search results bring up stuff on your hard drive, docs, pictures, music, ect. Figure it will only be a matter of time for Google to index the content of your hard drive and presents it to users in their web search. If they do a bit at a time until people get used to it, once it is implemented most people will use it because they will be used to it and it will be integrated into their lives.
No way. No one uses my computer but me, and if anyone did, they better not be able to see everything. This better be opt-in all the way.
“once it is implemented most people will use it because they will be used to it and it will be integrated into their lives.”
We are the Google. You will be assimilated. Resistance is futile.
If you have to opt-in then why would Google get sued again? If they snuck it in there like Facebook likes to do that would be a different story.
Seriously? How fucked up is this?
I know I let my friends look stuff up on my computer when they are over to visit, or on my laptop when we’re out. I don’t want them getting snippets from my email!
Even on my home computer I don’t leave Facebook or Google automatically signed in. Habit from computer lab days in college I guess.
On this note, anyone have a reccommendation for a free email? I want to drop Yahoo for my commerce email due to their recent changes. Don’t want to change to Google. Don’t want to use a secondary address on my ISP account in case I change in the future.
Hotmail? [ducks]
Almost free, cotse.net some accounts are ~$5/year and have nearly every filtering capability known to man.
Hotmail is now Outlook.com and it is really nice. I know many people have switched over from Google, I did. Check it out. http://www.theverge.com/2012/7/31/3201345/outlook-com-hotmail-preview-features-screenshots
“Google hopes to expand the feature to all e-mail providers”
They want people to give google the right to sniff through and access all peoples email accounts and all for the sake of ads? This is so bad it enters the realm of raunchy. If you want to search your gmail, you go into gmail and search your gmail. You do not need to search your old mail on every email provider every time you make a websearch.
Very few will want to do this by opting in so once again they will probably have to try something fishy if not downright illegal like they did with Wave to automatically opt people in.
Presumably this would only work if you’re logged in to your Google account, in which case gaining access to your e-mail is as simple as clicking the Gmail link in the black header bar.
>www.google.com
>what is my bank account number and balance?
DAMMIT WHY WON’T IT TELL ME?? I’m logged into my bank’s website! Google, please invent this so I don’t ever have to leave your site!
Well this isn’t good. Let’s hope no one in the family is secretly gay. They will be outed and might kill themselves. Let’s see how Google likes that lawsuit.
Why not just log out of your Google account when you aren’t using it?
Facebook would be a more than willing partner in this endeavour…….if the price is right.
Haha! Really?! Okay, so here’s a leap… Consumerist was just hacked… Imagine your emails contain information about where you blog, bank and imbibe, and now imagine the exploits awaiting your gmail account(s), calendar(s), etc. Then imagine if you, or others you know have email accounts included in those searches…. Yes, not only can they exploit you, but everyone you know, including their emails and with tons of private information. The combinations of information exposed Google is providing for world class hacks is infinite. Monumentally a dumb idea, which Google of course excels at.
and then imagine a pink fairy comes down and seduces you on this journey… but wait! you were just too high and all of the stuff imagined wear produced out of fear from lack of understanding.
curse the lack of edit and not double checking my post prior to submission: wear = were*
I found out how to ditch my flash drive!
Well, actually it was lost, but those things are so small and so easy to lose! Especially when your brain is being filled with everything from Spanish class, to the Pythagorean Theorem, its easy to forget the flash drive in the computer lab.
There is any easier way, and hope for us all!
Google Docs, or Google Drive as its being renamed is the answer.
No more having to worry about saving and dragging files around and making sure it is the most recent copy.
No more emailing back and forth and waiting for the rest of your group to email you their notes.
No more compatibility problems with people using old verions of Microsoft Word, or even Macs and PCs.
Its all run inside your browser, and it is accessible from any computer and always up-to-date.
If you want me to email you the tips I use to make school more effective with Google Docs, leave your email below and every morning I'll send you 1 new tip!
http://googledocs.simplelander.com/