Google Toolbar - spyware?

[Runawayrentals]

Anyone who thinks google toolbar ISNT spyware needs to look at this.... I was just doing some work on some sites I just moved to a new server a few hours ago. I was working on a cgi script linkback.pl, note, cgi-sys has never been used on any of my servers till literally just now, while doing it googlebot mediapartner crawls the exact link.... Again this link does not exist on my site, it is a link that I just made to test the linkback..., and this server has only been used today. Check out the logs... of course I removed the actual hosts and replaced them


.bellsouth.net - - [31/Dec/2003:22:22:39 -0600] "GET /cgi-sys/linkback.pl?http://www.HOST.com HTTP/1.1" 200 219 "-" "Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1; Alexa Toolbar; .NET CLR 1.1.4322)"
.bellsouth.net - - [31/Dec/2003:22:22:39 -0600] "GET /cgi-sys/linkback.pl?links; HTTP/1.1" 200 127 "http://www.HOST.com/cgi-sys/linkback.pl?http://www.HOST.com" "Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1; Alexa Toolbar; .NET CLR 1.1.4322)"
crawler4.googlebot.com - - [31/Dec/2003:22:22:47 -0600] "GET /cgi-sys/linkback.pl?http://www.HOST.com HTTP/1.0" 200 207 "-" "Mediapartners-Google/2.1 (+http://www.googlebot.com/bot.html)"
.bellsouth.net - - [31/Dec/2003:22:24:18 -0600] "GET /cgi-bin/linkback.pl?http://www.HOST.com HTTP/1.1" 500 - "-" "Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1; Alexa Toolbar; .NET CLR 1.1.4322)"


Happy New Years!

[cbp]

The toolbar reports the URL's you visit, so doing this means it could be considered spyware.

But you clearly agreed when you installed the toolbar at installation time to this, so its not spyware.

Google give you the option to turn this feature off.

CBP

[minstrel]

No, of course it isn't spyware - That's just plain outright silly...

You can't enable ANY of the features on Google which track anything you're doing without a popup warning you that enabling those features will mean that some information about your internet activities will be sent back to Google. They are NOT enabled by default.

If somebody asks me if I mind wearing a tracking device and I say, "not at all... go ahead", that's not spying - that's providing information by consent.

You cannot enable those Google toolbar features without giving informed consent. And if you didn't give that consent, then someone else who uses your computer did. Again, those features are not installed by default - someone at some point has to click on a box agreeing to install them.

And by the way, if someone other than you DID enable the features and you don't want them enabled, simply click on the Google drop-down box on the left hand side of the toolbar and select options and turn them off. Everything else will continue to work just fine.

[Runawayrentals]

It might not be spyware in the same sense as items that are installed with other items and not known about... kazaa, alexa, etc... But you have t admit it was very creepy to be working on something brand new and watching the logs and see google hit that link/page so quick.

I do understand the toolbar sends items back to google, but to be at my feet within a couple minutes of working on that new link? Thats down right creepy.

[minstrel]

Well, I don't know if it's creepy, but it's easy to disable if it bothers anyone...

It's a personal choice but it is a choice: I admit that I don't usually enable such features because to me it's a matter of principle - I figure if we don't protect our privacy, in time maybe we'll lose the right to do so (I was astounded recently to discover, after receiving a traffic ticket, that the Ministry of Transportation here has computerized records of every ticket I've ever received going back to 1982!).