Are you someone who's becoming more and more apprehensive about the data collection activities and business policies of Google, Inc.? Well, you're in good company.
Google is increasingly relying upon sensitive information that it collects or scans to make money, and is offering products to users which do not have adequate measures in place to protect privacy. Google seems to have discarded its internal motto of "Do No Evil" in pursuit of the Almighty Dollar.
On the Internet, Google is everywhere - and the company is engaged in continually working to expand its reach. What's more, Google has a near monopoly in the online advertising and search business. Plus, its support for many of its products is lackluster at best and terrible at worst.
When something goes wrong, it can be days before Google even admits the problem, let alone gets it fixed. That's the hidden price of many of Google's "free" products.
The following is a short selection of articles, blog posts, and columns that explain more about Google and its relentless assault on your privacy.
- The Evil Side of Google - Exploring Google's User Data Collection - "The final resting place for data at Google is likely in permanent storage. Google's privacy policies hint that some user data can never be completely deleted because of permanent backups."
- Google Chrome OS - do we want another monoculture? - "But regardless of Brin's claims, the new model pushes users towards Google. That means more opportunities to collect your data - and serve you ads. Whatever you think of Chrome OS - it may work and it may not - always remember that Google is, at heart, an advertising company."
- Is Google Turning Into Big Brother? - "Microsoft only wanted all of our money. Increasingly, it seems that Google wants all of our data. In running away from the evil empire, have we now instead rushed into the arms of Big Brother?"
- Google's User Data Empire - "For Google, it’s different. Their specialty is organizing information. They have access to more avenues for userdata than any other company in the history of the world, and the ability to connect every aspect of every person’s life."
- What Google Knows About You - "Perhaps the biggest concern for privacy advocates is how the treasure trove of data Google has about you might end up in the wrong hands. It is, says Bankston, a wealth of detailed, sensitive information that provides 'one-stop shopping for government investigators, litigators and others who want to know what you've been doing.'"
- The Next Net - "The search engine has dissected the behavior of Web surfers, including which sites they visit and which they link to. With this knowledge, Google proceeded to develop a map of the influence and relevance of billions of Web sites. It's the heart of its search and advertising business."
- Does Google Know Too Much About You? - "According to its privacy page on Google's Mobile Privacy page, the company says, 'for products and services with voice recognition capabilities, we collect and store a copy of the voice commands you make to the product or service.' No doubt Google does this to improve its voice recognition services, but still: Google has a copy of your voice on file."
- Is Google Evil? - "Google already knows more about you than the National Security Agency ever will. And don't assume for a minute it can keep a secret. YouTube fans - and everybody else - beware."
- RSnake picks on Google Health... yes, Google wants your medical records, too! - "Seriously, with all that Google has undertaken, it’s become a one-stop shop for identity theft and privacy breach."
- Google's Ad Targeting Turns Algorithms on You - "Soon, everything of Google’s that you touch will all become part of your profile — from its website analytics program, sneaky Big Brother-esque Web History program, checkout system, news subscription reader, image search, cellphone location reporting service, book digitization, news site and GMail e-mail and chats."
- Ads Follow Web Users, and Get More Personal - "In 2000, DoubleClick abandoned plans to connect online and offline data after a huge outcry. Google, which later acquired DoubleClick, has been conducting studies that connect the two areas."
- 25 Surprising Things Google Knows About You - "Google is the go-to provider of many things online-search, email, maps, and more. But have you ever stopped to consider all of the information you’re sharing with Google? Read on, and find out all of the dirt that Google has on you."
Don't like the idea of Google being able to build a complete profile of you and know everything about you (where you live, where you work, when you're sleeping, what your interests are, who you hang out with)? Wondering what you can do to change this situation?
Well, there's a pretty simple way to put your mind at ease, and protect your privacy.
Leave Google behind.
This site exists to help users who have made the decision to part ways with Google, and stop relying on it for everything from email to search to chat. There are alternatives out there for every product or service Google offers. Each category below offers a sampling of non-Google choices. You don't have to rely on one of Google's competitors for everything.
The best practice is to find a reliable web host that cares about privacy... and set up shop there. Trust us, it's totally worth the money. Especially if you own your own business.
Note that many of the websites on this list display Google ads, or serve up their own behavioral targeting ads. Unless you take action to block these ads from displaying, Google and other companies will still be able to track you and build a profile of you!
Search
News and Blog Search
- Technorati - Beats Google Blog Search, hands down.
- IceRocket - Excellent blog and news search. Also superior to Google Blog Search.
- Twingly - They have a very appealing sales pitch... "You know how tiring it is to go through 100's of links every day just to find the one or two that matters? Get started with Twingly in just 60 seconds or less and never spend time on irrelevant news again."
- Northern Light - Decent search engine of traditional media sources
- RSS Micro - Nifty search engine that looks for RSS feeds and RSS feed entries that match queries.
Real Time and Social Search
- Twitter - Find out what people are thinking and saying.
- Topsy - Find information that's being posted in real time on Twitter. Unlike Twitter Search (which is also useful) Topsy searches for URLs that are in tweets. Topsy is a great Google substitute and especially excels at finding stuff that has just been posted.
- Crowdeye - What all the Twitter is about. Not quite as comprehensive as Topsy, but worth a try. Its frontpage is styled very similar to Google News, although the site itself does not utilize Google code.
- OneRiot - Like Topsy and CrowdEye, but its scope is broader. (For instance, it indexes links from Digg.) "The end result is a search experience that allows users to find the freshest, most socially-relevant content from across the realtime web."
Image Search + Photo Sharing
- Ditto - One of the oldest visual search engines out there
- Flickr - Search directly from the homepage (Flickr is owned by Yahoo).
- Picsearch - An image search service with more than 3,000,000,000 pictures. Filtering can be enabled.
- Image After - A large, searchable, online photo collection. And it's free!
- Open ClipArt - Searchable archive of user contributed clip art
Browser
Tip: The following are excellent alternatives to both Chrome and Internet Explorer. Oh, and one other thing: Avoid browser toolbars (like Google Toolbar) at all costs. Every good modern browser has a built in search box anyway.
- Mozilla Firefox - Widely used, frequently updated, secure, and stable. Google Search is the default - be sure to change that!
- Opera - Like Firefox, it's cross platform. Google Search is the default - be sure to change that!
- Lobo - An open source browser, written in Java. Portable and secure. To ditch Google as default search, click the Tools menu, click Preferences, then select Tools. On the right side click the Add button and fill out the form fields to add Scroogle, Cuil, or something else.
- Avant Browser - Based on Internet Explorer's Trident engine - a nice IE upgrade. Google Search is the default - be sure to change that!
Desktop Search
Email
Tip: The best of the following options is the first, Hushmail. If you signup, go for their Business plan... you get to use your own domain, which means you get a nice address (firstname@yourdomain.com) plus you can take your domain to another provider.
- Hushmail.com: The world's most secure free email service. They actually care about your privacy... email is encrypted!
- Gawab - Get a ten gigabyte inbox (multiple domain names to choose from)
- Inbox.com - Get a thirty gigabyte inbox
- Rediffmail - Free, "unlimited" storage
- BigString - Allows a user to easily send, recall, erase, self-destruct and modify an email after it has been sent. Be warned: the body of your emails will be images only. That's how BigString makes it possible to "recall" an email - they delete the image that goes in the body of the message.
Blogging (Hosted)
Tip: When creating a blog, sign up with your own domain - that way it's easy to change providers later if you wish, or move your blog to your own server and import it into a content management system.
- WordPress.com - Jump in and start blogging without having to set anything up.
- LiveJournal - SUP Fabrik's popular network of personal blogs.
- TypePad - Six Apart's premier hosted blogging service.
- Tumblr - A cool hosted microblogging and blogging platform. Signing up is ridiculously simple.
Feed Reading
Tip: To leave Google Reader, export your RSS feeds into an OPML file and import that file into one of these alternatives. Here's how: In Google Reader, Click Settings (upper right corner) then click the Import/Export tab. Click the link that says Export your subscriptions as an OPML file. Save this file to your desktop. Once you're set up with your new feed reader, use their importer to bring your feeds back.
- Bloglines - As they say, it's the same internet minus the clutter
- Netvibes - Brings together your favorite media sources and online services
- Feed on Feeds - Run an aggregator on your own web server
- Gregarius - Another aggregator for your web server
Video
Tip: Surprisingly, there's a lot of great video-sharing sites out there that rival YouTube in almost every respect
- Veoh - All the Videos, TV Shows and Movies You Want to Watch. All In One Place.
- Blip.tv: "We've got a great service for great shows. We leave you free to focus on creativity."
- Metacafe: Video entertainment, powered by you
- Revver: An online media network that shares ad revenue with users
- Ustream - The best place to find live net broadcasting
Virtual Globe and Mapping
Chat and Instant Messaging
Tip: Use a Extensible Messaging and Presence Protocol (XMPP) client. Google provides XMPP gateways to its service, so you can keep chatting with friends who haven't wised up and decided to ditch Google Talk and/or Gmail. Once you've downloaded a client, you can sign up for a free screen name at jabber.org.
- Pidgin - Probably the best XMPP client out there. Also supports AIM, MSN, and Yahoo.
- Psi - Another cross platform XMPP client.
- Gajim - Yet another cross platform XMPP client.
- Adium -Excellent choice for Mac OS users.
Groups
Tip: For greater control and customization (and privacy) consider installing Mailman or Sympa in your own server environment.
- FreeLists - Provides free mailing list hosting to lists whose topics are related to technology, science, medicine, etc.
- Coollist - web-based system for anyone to easily create FREE mailing lists.
- Topica - "The Leader in Email Discussion Lists"
- Free Conversant - "The Talk of the Net"
Payment Processing
Tip: Webmasters and business owners, save yourselves a ton of trouble by avoiding services like Google Checkout and its equally bad rivals, PayPal and Amazon Payments. These services are NOT banks and make it very difficult to customize a shopping experience! The following are recommended merchant service providers and payment processors.
Analytics
Tip: An even better option than any of these is to run a logfile analyzer on your own server, like AWStats or W3Perl, if your host allows you to do so. Steer clear of Urchin - it's owned by Google.
- StatCounter - A free yet reliable invisible web tracker, highly configurable hit counter.
- GoStats - A reliable web stats traffic counter service since 1999
- Clicky - Monitor, analyze, and react to your blog or web site's traffic in real time.
- Hitstats - Professional and free web tracker
- Piwik - Open source JavaScript based analytics software that runs on your own server. Great replacement for Google's spyware.
Productivity Applications
Tip: Looking to move office collaboration into the cloud? You'll be pleased to know that Google Docs is not the only game in town.
- Zoho - As one analyst puts it... "They've got more applications than Google.... The apps they have are richer"
- ThinkFree - Another online suite that's more secure and nimble than Google Docs
- Ajax13 - Not quite as good as either Zoho or ThinkFree, but their products have some unique features.
- Zimbra Collaborative Suite - An excellent choice if you want email + productivity apps all-in-one. Very configurable.
Call Routing and Visual Voicemail
Tip: Why use Google Voice when there are better options available?
- YouMail - Available as an app for BlackBerry and iPhone. Cell phone voicemail that saves you time.
- Ribbit Mobile - Very similiar to YouMail. "Transform your phone."
Finally, there's even an alternative to the overhyped "Google Wave" ... Mozilla Raindrop. It's still in early development but it looks promising.
Learn how to block Google from invading your privacy within Firefox.
