By Jacqui Cheng | Ars Technica
Google is attempting to consolidate the growing number of lawsuits against the company as a result of its "accidental" WiFi data collection. Meanwhile, a privacy group has analyzed an independent analysis of the situation and is now accusing Google of having "criminal intent" with the whole debacle.
Google filed a motion in the US Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation this week, seeking to roll all eight lawsuits (plus any that might pop up in the future) pertaining to the data collection situation into one case. "All of the complaints in the Google Wi-Fi Cases assert claims under the federal Wiretap Act," wrote Google. "All of the complaints make very similar factual allegations, and thus any necessary discovery will be of common facts."
Because the cases span different jurisdictions, with some making claims under specific state laws, Google argues in its motion that there's potential for conflicting pretrial rulings, "especially with respect to the proper scope and extent of discovery, class certification and other factual and legal matters." Google would like a single, monster suit to be filed in the US District Court of Northern District of California—the company's home turf.
Meanwhile, Privacy International has turned up the heat on Google after having analyzed an independent report (PDF) on the situation conducted by technical services firm Stroz Friedberg. The report details what kind of data Google's code did and did not collect, as well as how it was processed and stored. Put simply, a program called "gslite" sniffed packets from unprotected WiFi networks as Google's Street View cars rolled down the street, separating out encrypted and unencrypted content. The encrypted data was dumped while the unencrypted data was then written to the car's hard drive.
Because of this specific behavior of the program, PI says it's clear that Google made no mistake at all—"It is a criminal act commissioned with intent to breach the privacy of communications," wrote PI. The group says that some jurisdictions allow for accidental interception of data, but that Google clearly had "intent to intercept" and therefore is in violation of criminal law.
Google CEO Eric Schmidt spoke openly last week about the company's gaffes, noting that he hoped Google's honesty would help reassure the public that it wouldn't happen again. Though most of the 600GB of data collected globally probably consists primarily of lolcats and fart app downloads, Google has definitely struck a sensitive nerve among users, privacy groups, and lawmakers alike.
Google is attempting to consolidate the growing number of lawsuits against the company as a result of its "accidental" WiFi data collection. Meanwhile, a privacy group has analyzed an independent analysis of the situation and is now accusing Google of having "criminal intent" with the whole debacle.
Google filed a motion in the US Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation this week, seeking to roll all eight lawsuits (plus any that might pop up in the future) pertaining to the data collection situation into one case. "All of the complaints in the Google Wi-Fi Cases assert claims under the federal Wiretap Act," wrote Google. "All of the complaints make very similar factual allegations, and thus any necessary discovery will be of common facts."
Because the cases span different jurisdictions, with some making claims under specific state laws, Google argues in its motion that there's potential for conflicting pretrial rulings, "especially with respect to the proper scope and extent of discovery, class certification and other factual and legal matters." Google would like a single, monster suit to be filed in the US District Court of Northern District of California—the company's home turf.
Meanwhile, Privacy International has turned up the heat on Google after having analyzed an independent report (PDF) on the situation conducted by technical services firm Stroz Friedberg. The report details what kind of data Google's code did and did not collect, as well as how it was processed and stored. Put simply, a program called "gslite" sniffed packets from unprotected WiFi networks as Google's Street View cars rolled down the street, separating out encrypted and unencrypted content. The encrypted data was dumped while the unencrypted data was then written to the car's hard drive.
Because of this specific behavior of the program, PI says it's clear that Google made no mistake at all—"It is a criminal act commissioned with intent to breach the privacy of communications," wrote PI. The group says that some jurisdictions allow for accidental interception of data, but that Google clearly had "intent to intercept" and therefore is in violation of criminal law.
Google CEO Eric Schmidt spoke openly last week about the company's gaffes, noting that he hoped Google's honesty would help reassure the public that it wouldn't happen again. Though most of the 600GB of data collected globally probably consists primarily of lolcats and fart app downloads, Google has definitely struck a sensitive nerve among users, privacy groups, and lawmakers alike.
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