It also means that you should not expect "personal privacy" when on a corporate computer on a corporate network It is called maintaining "Corporate Security".
And, malicious or not, if an application "phones home" for any reason, that's enough to classify it as spyware in my humble opinion. Posted by: Jim 14 Mar FYI, I have had my web history recorded onto another person's google account inadvertantly and without my knowledge. Another person logged onto google from my computer unknown to me and left their account logged in.
I then used the computer and had my activity recorded into their google history. That's spyware if you ask me. I detected the incident sometime later and only by chance was able to change their password and purge their web history. Posted by: Terrence Morrison 24 Jun For the disbelievers, go stick your head in the sand and hope that you don't get this one. Posted by: John 20 Aug I am the Director of IT at my organization and we have a tight policy of NOT allowing programs such as Google Desktop or toolbar to be downloaded onto network computers.
The reason for this is that it does relay uncontrolled information outside of the network. The debate about whether or not this information is "personally identifiable" has no concern to me. Rather, it is the fact that it is an uncontrolled information security breach that is the concern. Even "benign" information can come back to haunt an organization. Posted by: Your Mom 28 May You're a complete idiot if you don't realize the sort of "uncontrolled information" a typical corporate user has access to.
Take a typical user in a financial organization dealing with EFTs. If that user has access to PCI DSS sensitive info, then some random toolbar the user finds useful also has that access.
I don't think you'd be so cavalier in trying to defend a novelty toolbar if you really understood anything about computer security. If an authorized user has access to information any software they run has the same privileges, if not more.
But this article is dealing specifically with the question of the Google Toolbar -- not ALL random novelty toolbars. I'll agree that some are a huge risk, perhaps even malware. Spyware simply means collecting information on the user. It means software to spy with. Google is just that. Disclosing that they are going to spy on you because everyone reads the fine print right? Stop misleading people and just call it what it is. When you visit a website, certain things are logged on the remote web server.
Posted by: Frank 22 Nov This is the definition of spyware from the PC Magazine Encyclopedia, very similar to the definition of the poster above, who you accused of making up his own facts.
Now there may or may not be other definitions of "spyware" but at least there seems to be some consent here. Furthermore a website wouldn't qualify as spyware since it isn't software. Software that sends information about your Web surfing habits to its Web site. Often quickly installed in your computer in combination with a free download you selected from the Web, spyware transmits information in the background as you move around the Web. Also known as "parasite software," "scumware," "junkware" and "thiefware," spyware is occasionally installed just by visiting a Web site see drive-by download.
The license agreement that everyone accepts without reading may actually state that you are installing spyware and explain what it does. For example, it might say that the program performs anonymous profiling, which means that your habits are being recorded, not you individually.
Such software is used to create marketing profiles; for example, people who go to Web site "A" often go to site "B" and so on. Spyware may deliver competing products in real time.
For example, if you go to a Web page and look for a minivan, an ad for a competitor's vehicle might pop up see adware. According to the definition of the PC Magazine's Encyclopedia Google's toolbar does qualify as spyware.
Perhaps according to your own definitions it doesn't, it would be interesting to know where you got them from. Ask any programmer or web developer and they'll laugh at that! Your IP address, which was recorded by this website, tells me that you are located in the Madrid region of Spain, likely in the city of Miraflores De La Sierra.
Unless you're using some sort of proxy or IP redirection, the IP lookups are quite accurate at providing geophyiscal location data. Before you found my site, you went to Google. ES Google Spain and returned to my site. You viewed several pages there, and after another 15 minutes you posted this comment.
You should not be shocked at any of those details, because EVERY website on the planet records that same details and more for every visitor.
If you want to classify Google Toolbar as "spyware" and thereby satisfy a personal "Google is Evil" vendetta, then fine. But I maintain that spyware is something that connotes evil intentions. And if you go back to the origins of the genre, you'll see that it was almost universally seen in that light.
Posted by: Dano 27 Jan What does this say:- " Well I wonder what the implications of that are??? Your IP address is public info, and that's by design. It doesn't reveal anything about you personally, except the approximate geographic location of your ISP. And sometimes not even that much.
Posted by: NonyaBusiness 23 Feb Now the "EDITOR" may be trying to defend Google for whatever reason but it doesn't change the fact that Google is in the business of gathering data it can use to leverage a greater market share and thus increase it's profits.
Where do you think that data comes from? For that matter, what about some of the other nasties that Google and other websites are now using to gather more data that was previously unavailable to them. Yahoo and other sites are all doing the same thing and that definitely qualifies as spyware in my book.
My point is that it stands to reason that any company who is in the business of gathering information and is well known for doing questionable things should not be trusted. Why do you trust your browser, word processor, or favorite game any more than a toolbar? Posted by: D 13 Apr It's called profiling. Knowing one or two sites a person has visited usually tells you little to nothing about their overall behavior.
A complete browsing history, on the other hand, is an altogether different matter. That is why using a single search engine for everything is problematic in and of itself, even without the toolbar. And the toolbar would ideally like to track every page you visit in your browser - be it through one search engine or another, or without any search engine whatsoever.
It's what they're made for, ultimately: information gathering and advertisement. Or do you think companies are trying to force their 'amazing' toolbars on you at all corners, including them with all sorts of completely random, independent other software installations, just to make your life easier - out of the goodness of their hearts?
And even that isn't really all that certain anymore. Ultimately, with every non open-source software, it's always a matter of trust, and, like it or not, toolbars generally tend to belong to the less trustworthy category, simply because of their purpose.
And google in particular hasn't exactly made itself appear very trustworthy in recent time, either; what with stunts such as a separately operating updater, that will not only start itself with the computer and call home several times an hour even if none of their software is in use, but is also about as difficult to root out as your average piece of malware. But it's all perfectly legit, of course - people are, after all, informed of its installation in the fine print of the EULA, which, as Google well knows, is dutifully read by each and every user of their software ;.
Posted by: Brandon 26 Apr Simply put "yes" the google toolbar is spyware. It collects data about your usage and sends it back to Google. That's the definition of spyware. The only difference is Google tells you they're doing it and you're giving them permission to do it. They've lost all trust I don't use them for search anymore. Posted by: BD 30 Nov Looks like the editor is struggling here. Highlight : highlights the words in the page that match your search. Word Find : words entered in the Toolbar search box each get their own Word Find button.
Click a button to see where the word appears on the page. Translate languages Toolbar will automatically translate web pages written in foreign languages. Visit a site written in a foreign language and Toolbar will offer to translate it for you. See the translation of a single word on a page just by hovering over it.
Always translate pages in certain languages in Toolbar Options.
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