Commentary: Google and Staples–A Tale of 2 Privacy Policies

Yesterday, Google announced that it would start tracking users information across the 60+ applications hosted by Google including their search engine, Google+, Gmail, android phones and even Blogger, which is where this blog is hosted.  In a way it is good that Google is upfront about tracking user information and targeting ads and pop-ups to what the user is looking at or searching for.  Its bad that anybody who uses anything Google will be tracked and market targeted with ads that they may not want or care about.  To make matters worse, even though the information is anonymously store, it still knows who you are.  Since I am such a strong advocate of privacy, I have actually considered moving this blog to a more friendly site like WordPress.  I will let everybody know if I plan on doing such a thing, but for now I am here and will continue to be here at least until mid-March when the changes take place.  However, the one thing that I think is funny now is when I load up the blog, I see ads for Staples on my anti-Staples blog.  I wonder if anybody else sees this like I do.  I am interested in hearing from anybody who does.

Staples, on the other hand, has decided to be very secretive about the data it collects, where it collects it, and how long it is stored.  Just a look at the Staples.com website shows that there is NO indication that Staples is PCI compliant.  I am not going to go into details on what exactly this is because it is complex, but a search will provide plenty of information on this standard. 

If you read my previous post about the Better Business Bureau closing my case against Staples, one thing should have been obvious:  the letter was generic and computer generated.  I highly doubt that any REAL person closed this complaint, but instead it was closed because it was open for exactly 3 weeks and Staples had refused to respond to my last complaint in 5 business days.  I believe that this was purposely done by Staples just so they would not have to explain how my email address got linked by another family member’s credit card.  This is definitely fraud which the company is avoiding and thus smartly let the time to let the case close itself without having to respond.  Shame on Staples for this action!  Later, I will be telling of other privacy policies that Staples clearly violated and I will guarantee it will anger people! 

So, Google smartly lets people know of the company’s intentions upfront, whereas Staples makes claims that it does nothing wrong and doesn’t violate any laws, but who’s laws are they going by anyway?  I know in the days and weeks ahead much will be said about the Google privacy change, but the Staples one will sadly continue because the company is so sly and divertive that their evil ways will continue until someone really decides to sue this evil company for the theft which they are creating. 

We can only hope that eventually the smart thing will be done with both companies and their privacy policies will change and will not steal customer’s information without their knowledge.  I highly doubt there will be any significant change in the near future.