Introduction 

A small issue in recent and today’s time is googlization. Googlization is the broad expansion of google’s technology aspect. We know google has taken over the world in many parts. They are a main factor or the X factor for the internet along with other companies they own that we use. In the book Siva talks about the dangers of googlization. The main focal point of the book are the issues we should worry about. While people can say there are positive effects googlization has brought. We also need to acknowledge the negative effects that stem from googlization. The first issue brought up was google street view. This allowed people to look up an address and see a visual picture of the street and house of the address. The problem with this is the fact when it was first released it was set for maximum exposure meaning people, cars, or anything private were no longer private. Even with google blurring images that does not one hundred percent give privacy. You can still take notice of people if you know them well, or notice something in the background. The google view is a direct invasion of privacy within itself. Not too many people actually want their home addresses available to see. Google went out and did without consent. Which is why Germany threatened to sue Google if they did not comply. The same issue happened in Japan. Places Google did not consider to be private property from citizens, they took pictures. However, there are sacred places for Japanese people that they did not want publized. In this Case Analysis I will argue that consequentialism/utilitarianism shows us that Google should have put people’s privacy first over their new service. 

First Article 

Floridi’s first concept in the article is that the best way to deal with stuff like this is to create an informational gap. The more informational the gap is the less we know about each other. Not only that but it is harder to gather information about us. He goes on to talk about anonymity. Anonymity is making information about yourself completely unavailable. When I think about this I envision somebody buying their own private land and building their house foundation on it. Nobody knows about it, only people they have shown are allowed to visit. It is a great security measure to have. That is one concept I can say Floridi was right about one hundred percent. The concept of anonymity could have gone a long way in preventing googlization.

One of Floridi’s concept was why privacy matters. He was right in his concept that privacy matters on two small levels. The first level being that privacy is a security aspect of one’s self that they have a right to. The other being people being scared of the consequences if their privacy was breached. These two concepts go hand in hand directly to the original case. In this case people did not want their homes or any personal property/belongings exposed to the entire world. They do have a right to privacy for that. To focus on the flip side of the case. What happens to people if their privacy was breached? We know that aspect can vary in the different intentions people have. Now it was not reported in the case that anything bad happened to the people whose privacy was exposed. However what if it was that was the fear people had. A man in the case stated regularly that he did not live in a good neighborhood. If any cameras, pictures, or anything caught him that could ruin his reputation or worse his job. It lets people know he is around that area. What if someone wanted to cause harm to him? Now they know he lives in the area. They can easily look through the google system and find houses in the area and narrow down which one is his. These are all dangerous consequences if privacy is breached that can happen. 

Dealing with consequentialism being the actions taken by an entity being right or wrong. Another form of consequentialism is utilitarianism. Being doing the right thing for the greater good. In this case Google was wrong in their actions. They had the right idea for expanding their brand but just went about it the wrong way. They should have reached out to each country first and discussed a good way of going about adding the service they were offering. There were far more negative effects than positive effects for Google to implement this but they still implemented it anyway. They violated privacy rights, personal property, and possibly endangered billions of people in the process. In the end Googliation turned out okay and helped several people throughout the world. 

Second Article 

In the article (privacy as a product) he explains privacy only goes so far as we allow it. The main concept from this is facebook and social allowance of privacy. People overshare information all the time. We understand that whatever we post on social media can be seen but there are small loopholes these companies do that invade our privacy. However privacy is still privacy that users have a right to. Privacy for the younger generation is different from privacy for the older generation. We have new technological advancements being social media. It’s hard to keep privacy on social media because of everything that can be posted or hacked. 

His next concept was users on social media make rational privacy choices being a myth. Not everything is on the user’s end. A lot of these social media companies do not prioritize your data. Facebook had a networking system that allowed them to see the people who they networked with posts. One lady Andrea was not aware of this and had millions of people viewing her information she thought was private. Another error of the app is advertisement. They would advertise certain products saying certain people have bought this product too. This is another invasion of privacy because how does Facebook know any of these people wanted that information out there. It’s small mechanics like this that seem small but in the grand scheme of things it’s actually big. 

Understanding these concepts we can see Google and Facebook are in the same boat of invading privacy. Both Google and Facebook store our data in databases. They use this for their convenience of marketing. One could say this is the individual fault with consequentialism. Their actions of posting certain information on social media causes good or bad reactions. Those are millions of people seeing information that you did not intend, getting fired from a job, or even small mishaps like being hacked. These are all consequences from puting data out there from these apps. Like James said we should all limit the amount of information put out there. Part of the blame goes back onto both these companies though with utilitarianism. Google and Facebook both made services that were not user friendly for private needs. Facebook knew privacy was being invaded. They never came out and said how to fix it or limit it until they came under fire and saw the results limit their app use. The best decision would have been to do what Google did. Sit down and figure out agreements. Like the advertisements scheme. They could have still advertised similar products people bought without including their name as they do now. They could have allowed the privatization of posts. Both Google and Facebook implemented elements of services that did not privatize the consumer. Google did not allow you to private your home for their service. No matter what this is something the individual was not in control of when it came to privacy. It wasn’t until Google came under fire also when they had to privatize our information. 

Conclusion 

I feel as if there were several steps Google could have taken to make this transition of googlization go smoother. Instead of just coming through forcing their new product. It should have been regulated through countries. Others will look at this like it’s not a big deal. Some say nobody got hurt during this process. Googlization is actually a helpful tool. They fixed their mistakes in the world and agreed to terms. All of these are great points for a counter. However we should think why it had to even go this far. Every country google went into they were sued or almost sued. It’s not like they don’t know it’s an invasion of privacy. They one hundred percent know it is. Yes, googlization is a helpful tool for driving around. But just like this is a helpful tool it is also a harmful tool. If a criminal had a description of a house and knew the street. All he would have to do is look through the google view street until he finds the house that fits. There are several reports from 2010-2015 that support this claim. So looking back on it, are Google views really that helpful? Privacy should be before anything and now everybody is exposed. Google tried to do a good deed and while it does have it’s good. This also has its bad effects. A simple utilitarian approach would have solved this issue. They should have decided from that if this was ultimately going to be a good investment for everybody or a bad one. In this situation there were good and bad consequences. In my opinion I still think it’s a failed approach because the outcome should only be a positive outcome for everybody.