They admit to accidental wrongdoing and offer to make right. What does that get them? Threats from Germany.
Why poor Google? German recently ruled that if you have an unsecured WLAN and someone connects to it and shares copyrighted data through it, YOU are liable for having an unsecured WLAN. But collect one bit of that unsecured data and all of a sudden the other party is liable.
Send your data flying willy nilly through the air and you deserve to have it collected. I mean, even if you give away your encryption key it’s still encrypted, that’s the whole point of public key encryption. The German government should be less worried about Google (oooh they could fine them 300,000 Euros! They might almost be able to afford a Google stock option for that amount…) and more worried about the fact that anyone else in the country could be listening in. And if I know a thing or two about Germans, they most certainly are. They had a secret police up until a mere generation ago. Methinks thou doth protest too much.
I imagine many other companies would never admit such a thing, and either quietly bury it or keep and use the data. We should say “Wow, thanks for admitting this and trying to make it right. Lets help you make it right.” Instead they’re threatened legally. You want to know how Google’s gonna save themselves a potential $300,000 fine in the future? Yeah, they know now to keep that shit quiet and just bury it.
