EU regulators call on Google to stall new privacy measures

Post by Steven Cox on 3rd February 2012
 in Google, Search, Social media

Investigators from the European Union want Google to postpone the introduction of a new privacy policy, so that they can first investigate whether it sufficiently protects users' personal information.

Google announced last month that it was streamlining its privacy guidelines, and wanted to introduce a 'one size fits all' policy which could apply to all its functions and services.

But data protection chiefs from the 27 EU member countries and its ruling body, the European Commission, have now asked to take a closer look at the plans, before their due implementation date of March 1.

Reuters news agency quoted a letter from the EU officials to Google chief executive Larry Page, which said: "Given the wide range of services you offer, and the popularity of these services, changes in your privacy policy may affect many citizens in most or all of the EU member states.

"We wish to check the possible consequences for the protection of the personal data of these citizens in a coordinated way," they wrote.

Google said the communication was unexpected. Its Brussels-based spokesman, Al Verney, insisted that a briefing had been given to EU officials before it had officially announced the policy, and "none of them expressed substantial concerns at the time".

The document explains to users what information is collected about them by Google, why, how it is used, and how individuals can limit access to those details.

At the same time as Google's moves, the EU is also planning a revision of its own data protection rules. At 17 years old, these are now considered outdated given the amount of information which companies can currently legitimately gather about people's online activities.