Google accelerates Plus closure after another privacy lapse
SAN JOSE, California — Google is still having trouble protecting the personal information on its Plus service, prodding the company to accelerate its plans to shut down a little-used social network created to compete against Facebook.
A privacy flaw that inadvertently exposed the names, email addresses, ages and other personal information of 52.5 million Google Plus users last month convinced Google to close the service in April instead of August, as previously announced. Google revealed the new closure date and its latest privacy lapse in a Monday blog post.
It’s the second time in two months that Google has disclosed the existence of a problem that enabled unauthorized access to Plus profiles. In October, the company acknowledged finding a privacy flaw affecting 500,000 Plus users that it waited more than six months to disclose.
Google moved more quickly to own up to the most recent privacy problem on Plus. This time around, the names, email addresses, ages and other personal information of the affected Plus users were exposed for six days in November before it was fixed. No financial information or passwords were visible to intruders, according to Google. The company also said it hasn’t seen evidence indicating that unauthorized users who accessed Plus through the inadvertent peephole have misused any of the personal information.
Even if the latest privacy gaffe on Plus didn’t cause any major damage, it nevertheless marks another embarrassing incident for Google. The company’s business model relies on it being seen as a trustworthy guardian of the personal information it collects about the billions of people who use its search engine, Gmail, Chrome browser, maps, and Android software for smartphones.
Like Facebook, Google makes most of its money by selling ads that draw upon what the company learns about the interests, habits and locations of people while they’re using its free services.
Google’s privacy issues on Plus are likely to be a topic that U.S. lawmakers delve into today, when company CEO Sundar Pichai is scheduled to appear before a House committee.