Yawn: I don't know about you all, but I'm sick to death of the endless detailed reporting of every move in the case of Google's capture of scattered publicly unprotected Wi-Fi network packets. It was a colossal blunder on Google's part, and the firm hasn't handled its negotiations with various governments, local and national, as adeptly as it should.
But I expect it's actually as it seems. Bad program management that led to useless information being collected that wasn't acted on. Google will spend millions in defending itself against lawsuits and settling with governments. The company will agree to outside monitoring of certain behaviors in the future. It will be required to be less aggressive and arrogant in its assertion of rights on the public thoroughfares for Street View in many countries.
It's just not that big of a deal to most people unless an actual privacy breach is demonstrated in which Google was gathering data and associating in its systems in such a way as to render it better able to pinpoint individuals and then target advertisements or other information to them.
I have various news alerts set to trigger for Wi-Fi, and the thousands of stories filed and reprinted around the world have added nearly no information to the topic. Put Google, privacy, and wireless snooping into one story, and I guess it gets traffic. (See what I did just now?)
Ultimately, it was an interesting story, but it's not now unless new information appears; you won't be reading all the daily developments in it here.
Celine Dion is ‘waiting for good news’ on second pregnancyGoogle Has Been Collecting Wi-Fi Data, Accidentally
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