BRUSSELS - European Union Justice and Security Commissioner Franco Frattini has praised Google's move to limit private data storage to 18 months. The EU has previously expressed concern over the way Google stored data that would identify web users. Google's new move is an effort to mollify EU concerns and appears to have appeased the Union at the moment.
"I think it is indeed a good step," Frattini told reporters. "It is good to see Google trying to meet our expectations." In May the EU had observed that Google was failing to meet expectations as far as privacy concerns were concerned. It had asked Google to clarify on the issue before it met again in mid-June. In March Google had proposed a 18 to 24 month limit to private data storage.
"Retention of personal data was, from the very beginning, one concern of the European Commission," Frattini said. His comments follow the release of a report by Privacy International, which accused Google of being the most "hostile to data protection" among all major Internet companies.
Google general counsel Nicole Wong sought to rebut this claim and said, "We are disappointed with Privacy International's report which is based on numerous inaccuracies and misunderstandings about our services. We recognize that user trust is central to our business and Google aggressively protects our users' privacy."
Google has defended the retention of private search data by saying that it needs to save this data in order to improve its algorithm and also protect itself from hackers and spammers.
