Google breaches Canadian privacy laws,RIM's Balsillie deflects Jobs' reality distortion field

It's happened before and it is likely to happen again. While gathering photos and information for Google's Street View feature in its Google Maps application, the search giant has breached Canada's privacy laws by snagging people's emails and other private information. Canada's privacy commissioner has called Google out while revealing the findings of their investigation.

The investigation found the technology giant gathered email addresses, passwords, usernames and other personal information from unsecured wireless networks in Canadian neighbourhoods. Google has said that it the data capture was a 'careless error.' But this  is an error that has happened many times before.

The commissioner's office said the breaches were "the result of an engineer's careless error" and that a lack of privacy control measures were also responsible.

"Our investigation shows that Google did capture personal information — and, in some cases, highly sensitive personal information such as complete emails," privacy commissioner Jennifer Stoddart said in the news release. "This incident was a serious violation of Canadians' privacy rights.

 This was also the case in  Australia, Germany and  in Japan where Google faced similar breach of privacy issues. 

The Canadian privacy commissioner ordered Google to delete all of the confidential data collected in the country and said it must comply with its security recommendations by 1 February.

Google, whose primary business is selling online advertising, gains a lot from gathering personal information on its users' likes, preferences and web habits. Accusations that it is gathering this information illegally can be damaging and even devastating to a company that has, in the past decade, achieved an unprecedented recognition as the go-to website for all things search, email and cloud. 

How Google handles itself in Canada after this fiasco will reflect on them on a global scale.

Via Postmedia News, The Guardian.co.uk

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RIM's (Research in Motion) CEO Jim Balsillie responded to comments made by Apple CEO Steve Jobs during a recent earning's call where Jobs discussed the iPhone outselling RIM's BlackBerry handsets as well as the imminent failure of the upcoming 7-inch tablet competitors to the iPad. RIM is preparing to launch a 7-inch PlayBook tablet as an adjunct to its popular BlackBerry service.

According to Apple, it sold 14.1 million iPhones this quarter compared to RIM's 12.1 million BlackBerry units during the same period. Figures which Job highlighted during the earnings call which was highly publicized since it heralded Apple's most profitable quarter ever.

"As usual, whether the subject is antennas, (Adobe) Flash or shipments, there is more to the story and sooner or later, even people inside the distortion field will begin to resent being told half a story," Balsillie said. The RIM CEO said the higher sales of Apple's iPhones don't add up because RIM's second fiscal quarter ended Aug. 28, while Apple's quarter was over at the end of September.

The Reality Distortion Field is what many have called Steve Jobs'  overpowering charismatic ability to take the stage, build excitement around a product and sell ideas. 

RIM, based in Waterloo, Ont., had record shipments for five consecutive quarters and said it would ship between 13.8 million and 14.4 million devices in its current quarter. 

Apple is riding high these days and Steve Jobs seems to have no problem referencing its competitors during its events, launches and even its website which is sure to put them on the defensive. During the earning's call, Jobs also discussed the problems of Google's Android fragmentation and the effect on developers.

RIM is in a delicate position in the smartphone market as they haven't been able to pull a coup to compete with the surging popularity of the iPhone or the slew of exciting Android handsets coming out of the woodwork. It made a major PR push and threw a lot of publicity behind its latest handset, the BlackBerry Torch, which offered touch-capabilities as well as a slide out keyboard plus a revamped OS.

Usually that would have been enough to get people excited but the BlackBerry Torch received lukewarm reception even from BlackBerry apologists. It also outed information about its upcoming  PlayBook tablet but omitted pricing as well as release date information (pegging its availability as early 2011)