3 ms·

I'll take "Because Google's entire business model around email is processing it to serve relevant ads next to it, which requires that they be able to read it" f

by cheald 13y ago

I'll take "Because Google's entire business model around email is processing it to serve relevant ads next to it, which requires that they be able to read it" for $1000, Alex.

toyg 13y ago
They could still do that in a secure way, client-side, if they wanted: when content is displayed in-browser, javascript could parse it, send home relevant words (on an encrypted channel), and receive relevant ads. The server would have to ensure that data is not saved, or it's anonymously aggregated right away -- you'll have to trust their word on that, but that'll always be the case. Computationally expensive, maybe, but it's 2013 and browsers can take a bit of abuse. It wouldn't cover people using POP/IMAP, but Joe Average doesn't bother with that geekery anymore. Obviously it would take some time to implement, but it could be done.
- icebraining 13y ago
  I think it's a little naive to assume Google just matches a few words in each email and serves ads based on that.
  - toyg 13y ago
    I'm not saying it'd be a 100% drop-in replacement for what they have now, but it'd be a good approximation, a starting point. I'm a leeching AdBlock user anyway, these days I don't even see what they try to show me...
- codeka 13y ago
  They'd also have to do spam filtering client side, parsing the MIME to extract inline images, attachments and so on, sanitize the HTML to protected against XSS attacks, process it for full-text search, filtering into labels, auto-forwarding and really absolutely everything that happens to an email. They all involve "reading" the email.
  - toyg 13y ago
    To be fair, that's all stuff that "real" email clients already do.
coldtea 13y ago
Why does everyone assumes it's just about the "automated processing" they do? I'm 100% sure besides showing "relevent ads" in real time as you check your mail, they also keep a huge profile for your account name, cross check with all their other services and mainly search, and generally have a file on you and your preferences. And that's besides sharing your email with their government friends.
- cheald 13y ago
  Because this whole kerfluffle is about the fact that by granting Google the ability to spam-filter and process your email, you are giving up your legal expectation of privacy by placing your data into the hands of a third party. It's the lowest common denominator. Sure, they may be doing other stuff, but we know for a fact that they process your email in ways X, Y, and Z, which are what the legal theories are based upon.

by cheald 13y ago

I'll take "Because Google's entire business model around email is processing it to serve relevant ads next to it, which requires that they be able to read it" for $1000, Alex.

toyg 13y ago

They could still do that in a secure way, client-side, if they wanted: when content is displayed in-browser, javascript could parse it, send home relevant words (on an encrypted channel), and receive relevant ads. The server would have to ensure that data is not saved, or it's anonymously aggregated right away -- you'll have to trust their word on that, but that'll always be the case. Computationally expensive, maybe, but it's 2013 and browsers can take a bit of abuse. It wouldn't cover people using POP/IMAP, but Joe Average doesn't bother with that geekery anymore. Obviously it would take some time to implement, but it could be done.

icebraining 13y ago
I think it's a little naive to assume Google just matches a few words in each email and serves ads based on that.
- toyg 13y ago
  I'm not saying it'd be a 100% drop-in replacement for what they have now, but it'd be a good approximation, a starting point. I'm a leeching AdBlock user anyway, these days I don't even see what they try to show me...
codeka 13y ago
They'd also have to do spam filtering client side, parsing the MIME to extract inline images, attachments and so on, sanitize the HTML to protected against XSS attacks, process it for full-text search, filtering into labels, auto-forwarding and really absolutely everything that happens to an email. They all involve "reading" the email.
- toyg 13y ago
  To be fair, that's all stuff that "real" email clients already do.

coldtea 13y ago

Why does everyone assumes it's just about the "automated processing" they do? I'm 100% sure besides showing "relevent ads" in real time as you check your mail, they also keep a huge profile for your account name, cross check with all their other services and mainly search, and generally have a file on you and your preferences. And that's besides sharing your email with their government friends.

cheald 13y ago
Because this whole kerfluffle is about the fact that by granting Google the ability to spam-filter and process your email, you are giving up your legal expectation of privacy by placing your data into the hands of a third party. It's the lowest common denominator. Sure, they may be doing other stuff, but we know for a fact that they process your email in ways X, Y, and Z, which are what the legal theories are based upon.