Google to DOJ: Trust Us—You’re Screwing This Up

Google’s head of search, Elizabeth Reid, is not pleased with the DOJ’s proposed changes. She believes that if the court goes through with the DOJ’s remedy suggestions, consumers’ search privacy could be in jeopardy, not to mention that it will slow down innovation.

This was said during Google’s remedies trial following its loss in court. We’re talking about the Search case that Google lost, not the one related to its ad dominance, that’s something else entirely.

Google Search chief believes the DOJ’s remedy proposals are a huge mistake

Elizabeth Reid took the stand during the final week of the remedies trial. She said that these changes would “deeply undermine user trust.” Why did she say that? Well, the DOJ proposed a major breakup of Google, essentially. The government is requesting the divestiture of Google’s Chrome browser in addition to the release of Google’s search data and search index in order to help rival search engines.

Google’s head of search warned that publishing such data would risk harming users’ trust. “Once it’s turned over to a qualified competitor, there’s no further protections we can give,” she said. She also added that “a startup is generally not a target because it’s small, but now it has this huge treasure trove of data.”

She warned that such moves would undermine other Google products, and user trust

Reid warned that such a move would probably undermine other Google products. She believes that users would lose trust in other Google products because of it, and search overall, actually.

Reid also agreed with Google’s CEO, who took the stand last week. She said that bad actors could reverse-engineer Google’s systems if data-sharing proposals come to be, and that would make it easier to get spam and misinformation in search results.

The DOJ countered those comments. The government said that the likelihood of its data-sharing proposals causing problems for search users are minimal. The DOJ noted that Google began sharing its search-related technology with Yahoo Japan in 2010 and had no issues.

Reid warned that Google would have to dedicate a lot of its search workforce towards compliance

Elizabeth Reid also highlighted that the government’s proposals would harm Google’s ability to innovate. She added that more than 20% of the search engineering workforce would have to focus on compliance if these proposals come to pass, “because it’s so extensive and invasive.”

Google already announced that it will appeal the ruling, regardless of what it is. We knew that following the initial trial that took place last year. The company even proposed counter-remedies to what the DOJ requested. Judge Mehta doesn’t have an easy job here, as Google’s monopoly needs to be tackled, but it needs to be tackled properly, with the right balance.

The post Google to DOJ: Trust Us—You’re Screwing This Up appeared first on Android Headlines.