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Great discussion of the Google, Facebook, and other online sites, and their terms of service.Take Google, for example. Last month, the Electronic Privacy Information Center (I'm on its board of directors) filed a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission concerning Google's cloud computing services. On its website, Google repeatedly assures customers that their data is secure and private, while published vulnerabilities demonstrate that it is not. Google's not foolish, though; its Terms of Service explicitly disavow any warranty or any liability for harm that might result from Google's negligence, recklessness, malevolent intent, or even purposeful disregard of existing legal obligations to protect the privacy and security of user data. EPIC claims that's deceptive.

Facebook isn't much better. Its plainly written (and not legally binding) Statement of Principles contains an admirable set of goals, but its denser and more legalistic Statement of Rights and Responsibilities undermines a lot of it. One research group who studies these documents called it "democracy theater": Facebook wants the appearance of involving users in governance, without the messiness of actually having to do so. Deceptive.

Read this full article at Bruce Schneier

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