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Google+ Shut Down After Data Breach and Cover-Up are Exposed

posted by martyb on Tuesday October 09 2018, @05:23AM   Printer-friendly
from the how-many-projects-have-they-shuttered? dept.

takyon writes:

Google+ shutting down after users' data is exposed

Google is shutting down much of its social network, Google+, after user data was left exposed. It said a bug in its software meant information that people believed was private had been accessible by third parties. Google said up to 500,000 users had been affected.

According to a report in the Wall Street Journal, the company knew about the issue in March but did not disclose it. The WSJ quoted an internal Google memo that said doing so would draw "immediate regulatory interest".

In a statement, the firm said the issue was not serious enough to inform the public. "Our Privacy and Data Protection Office reviewed this issue, looking at the type of data involved, whether we could accurately identify the users to inform, whether there was any evidence of misuse, and whether there were any actions a developer or user could take in response. None of these thresholds were met here."

Also at The Verge, Engadget, and CNBC.

Original Submission

 
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  • (Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @06:11AM (1 child)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 09 2018, @06:11AM (#746309)

    Maybe Facebook can go next?

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  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by FatPhil on Wednesday October 10 2018, @08:51AM

    by FatPhil (863) <{pc-soylent} {at} {asdf.fi}> on Wednesday October 10 2018, @08:51AM (#746875) Homepage
    Well, the social networks that I remember failing are Buzz, Orkut, and Google+. All three of those were under Google's wings. Clearly google themselves are doing something wrong in this field. And if you consider how much data-mining they do, they basically know everything about everything you do in front of a computer (which includes phones), that does perhaps contain a small silver lining - perhaps all this "big data" isn't as useful as they think it is.
    --
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