Grist for tech bloggers outrage: AOL proudly releases search data of 650,000 AOL users (and, we might add, hurriedly un-releases it). They spend a good deal more keystrokes on warning that viewers may be offended than noting that customer privacy could possibly be at risk:
From the AOL readme file: CAVEAT EMPTOR -- SEXUALLY EXPLICIT DATA! Please be aware that these queries are not filtered to remove any content. Pornography is prevalent on the Web and unfiltered search engine logs contain queries by users who are looking for pornographic material. There are queries in this collection that use SEXUALLY EXPLICIT LANGUAGE. This collection of data is intended for use by mature adults who are not easily offended by the use of pornographic search terms. If you are offended by sexually explicit language you should not read through this data. Also be aware that in some states it may be illegal to expose a minor to this data. Please understand that the data represents REAL WORLD USERS, un-edited and randomly sampled, and that AOL is not the author of this data.
They're apparently in damage control mode now as they removed the data.
Update: Sometime around 7 pm PST on Sunday, the AOL site referred to below was taken down. The direct link to the data is still live. A cached copy of the page is here.
Further Update: Sometime after 7 pm the download link went down as well, but there is at least one mirror site. AOL is in damage control mode - the fact that they took the data down shows that someone there had the sense to realize how destructive this was, but it is also an admission of wrongdoing of sorts. Either way, the data is now out there for anyone that wants to use (or abuse) it.
Of course my work's stupid ISA server is screwing up again so most of the Internet for me is missing...
I just gotta see some of the interesting searches done by people
Though AOL is gonna get ALOT of backlash..its just a matter of when considering its early monday morning and people are just now waking up to hopefully see this news.
So they are going to make all their money through pop-up advertising? Is AOL going to be like NetZero when they first came out? How's this going to work?
Who at AOL could have POSSIBLY thought that this was a good idea? A bunch of brain dead circus monkeys could run a company better than these rocket scientists can. They've already got world famous customer service
As I listened to the CSR's objections in this video, my imagination started to run wild. I pictured an AOL CSR torture chamber, that for every customer allowed to cancel, the CSR gets one of his toenails yanked out by pliers. The CSR sounded so terrified of letting this customer cancel, that it makes one wonder what sort of negative incentive AOL places on CSRs who allow cancellations.
Can you imagine the lawsuits if someone is able to connect the dots? These 8 users are from the 1st file and I only looked for a few minutes... It's a shame that some of this stuff can be found on the web. Talk about sick.
So all these bloggers also think it's ethical to mirror the search data? I mean AOL is evil, but it's like: "Look AOL is evil for releasing the information!!! Imagine what sinister things people could do if they connect the dots!! Here's 30 mirror links to it!."
So all these bloggers also think it's ethical to mirror the search data? I mean AOL is evil, but it's like: "Look AOL is evil for releasing the information!!! Imagine what sinister things people could do if they connect the dots!! Here's 30 mirror links to it!."
Well, the genie is out of the bottle as of this moment, and blaming the "free" press for providing evidence of such won't do anything about it. Shooting the messenger gets you nowhere when the problem lies at the root. Had AOL not placed their head firmly up their ass regarding customer privacy, there would be no story or evidence of such.
Well.. really its not that big of a deal if you ask me.
If you think other sites aren't already tracking you and releasing information to various people you're probably pretty naive. its always best to assume that nothing is that private on the Internet (do a google for your handle here... or your name, for proof of that pudding).
All AOL did was release popular search keywords... why is this a big deal? Google not only releases popular keywords, they SELL keywords to advertisers (a process which requires them to give you a list with statistics...).
All AOL did was release popular search keywords... why is this a big deal? Google not only releases popular keywords, they SELL keywords to advertisers (a process which requires them to give you a list with statistics...).
The big deal is that AOL didn't have the foresight to consider that people might type their name, SSN, or CC numbers into the search box and hit enter, thus leaving traces of personally identifiable data.
And there is a huge difference between them selling the info to another company as outlined in their policies (who, one would hope, would be bound by contract to keep the raw data as proprietary information), and posting it to the public at large.
*******Update***** Monday July 7th 10 AM PST AOL Officially comments in the comments section below.
Andrew Weinstein
All
This was a screw up, and were angry and upset about it. It was an innocent enough attempt to reach out to the academic community with new research tools, but it was obviously not appropriately vetted, and if it had been, it would have been stopped in an instant.
Although there was no personally-identifiable data linked to these accounts, were absolutely not defending this. It was a mistake, and we apologize. Weve launched an internal investigation into what happened, and we are taking steps to ensure that this type of thing never happens again.
Here was what was mistakenly released:
* Search data for roughly 658,000 anonymized users over a three month period from March to May.
* There was no personally identifiable data provided by AOL with those records, but search queries themselves can sometimes include such information.
* According to comScore Media Metrix, the AOL search network had 42.7 million unique visitors in May, so the total data set covered roughly 1.5% of May search users.
* Roughly 20 million search records over that period, so the data included roughly 1/3 of one percent of the total searches conducted through the AOL network over that period.
* The searches included as part of this data only included U.S. searches conducted within the AOL client software.