Microsoft is on the defensive over its decision to hand over search data to the U.S. government, saying the company would
never compromise the privacy of its customers.
On the company's MSN Search Weblog, Ken Moss, general manager of MSN Web Search, said that Microsoft did not divulge any personal user information when it provided
the U.S. Department of Justice with data from its search service.
Moss said that the privacy of Microsoft customers is "non-negotiable" and the company aims to continue to protect customer
data and information. However, Microsoft thought it best to cooperate with the government's subpoena, handed down about six
months ago, but the company did so in a way so it would not violate customers' privacy.
"At MSN Search, we have strict guidelines in place to protect the privacy of our customers data, and I think you’ll agree
that privacy was fully protected," Moss said. "We tried to strike the right balance in a very sensitive matter."
Microsoft and other search engine providers Yahoo and America Online have come under heavy fire from both Internet users and
privacy advocates for complying with a U.S. government subpoena of their Internet search records. The DOJ said it needs the
information to defend the Child Online Protection Act (COPA), which it is trying to revive after it was struck down by the
U.S. Supreme Court two years ago.
Specifically, Moss said that Microsoft provided data that allows the DOJ to see how frequently some query terms occurred,
but does not allow the government to look up an IP (Internet Protocol) address to see what information was queried and cannot
look for users who searched for certain terms.
"We produced a random sample of pages from our index and some aggregated query logs that listed queries and how often they
occurred," Moss wrote on the blog Friday. "Absolutely no personal data was involved."
Search engine leader Google has so far refused to hand over search information to the DOJ, citing several reasons, including
concerns about violating its users' privacy, disclosing trade secrets and facing an undue burden in assembling the demanded
information.
Poll results published Tuesday by The Ponemon Institute LLC found that the majority of Internet users are on Google's side,
and a good number would stop using the company's search engine if it complied with the government.
More than 56 percent of respondents to a poll of 1,017 adult U.S. residents believe that Google should not hand over information
about search queries to the government, according to the institute, which conducts research on corporate governance, data
protection and privacy compliance.
About 41 percent of those who said Google should not provide the data to the DOJ said they would stop using Google's search
engine if the company complied, while 18 percent said they were not sure what they would do in that case.
Requests for an interview with Moss or other MSN representatives through Microsoft's public relations (PR) firm Waggener Edstrom
Inc. on Tuesday were denied. Beyond Moss's blog entry, the only information Microsoft provided on the matter was a written
statement submitted by e-mail through a PR representative.
"We take the privacy of our customers very seriously," the statement read. "We did comply with [the government's] request
for data in regards to helping protect children in a way that ensured we also protected the privacy of our customers."
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