[Ecommerce] Search Sites Unveil Privacy Plans - Ask.com beats them all hands down, again.

[Jeff Williams]

All,

  Well at least ASK beats them all hands down.  Hate to say I
told you so Declan and Lauren. >:)  However seems Google,
Yahoo, and MS are laggards again.  Weak business policy that,
on the part of MS, Yahoo and Google, but not unexpected.

  However this is an important step in the right direction, even
though the code/technology has been around for a number
of years.  It will help users and domain name holders from
being sniped, scamed and be a significant help in protecting
their Identity and from ID theft and to a much bigger degree
with ASK.COM.  Now if only ICANN will do that with Whois
and registrant data, we can take a bigger bite out of crime.  It
will also take some load off of law enforcement, which is greatly
needed.

See: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/6911527.stm

>From the article:

Action on privacy by the top four search sites. Google, Microsoft,
Yahoo,
and Ask have introduced plans to reduce the data they store and how long

they store it. From the article: "The rush to improve privacy policies
was
started by Google in March when it announced it would start deleting the

final parts of the individual address it collects from each user's
computer
after 18 months... Microsoft is expected to make a similar announcement
to
separate the identifying address and other data from searches after 18
months. The information will be held for longer if users request it.
Yahoo said it would delete identifying addresses and cookies after 13
months... Ask is taking the most radical step by unveiling plans for a
tool called AskEraser which, it claims, will let people tune whether
data
is gathered about them on a search-by-search basis.

Regards,
--
Jeffrey A. Williams
Spokesman for INEGroup LLA. - (Over 134k members/stakeholders strong!)
"Obedience of the law is the greatest freedom" -
   Abraham Lincoln

"Credit should go with the performance of duty and not with what is
very often the accident of glory" - Theodore Roosevelt

"If the probability be called P; the injury, L; and the burden, B;
liability depends upon whether B is less than L multiplied by
P: i.e., whether B is less than PL."
United States v. Carroll Towing  (159 F.2d 169 [2d Cir. 1947]
===============================================================
Updated 1/26/04
CSO/DIR. Internet Network Eng. SR. Eng. Network data security
IDNS. div. of Information Network Eng.  INEG. INC.
ABA member in good standing member ID 01257402
E-Mail jwkckid1@ix.netcom.com
 Registered Email addr with the USPS
Contact Number: 214-244-4827