I thought I was finished with the story of Google falsely accusing one of their users of child molestation but Ben Thompson of Stratechery has his own take on the matter that he describes in a long blog post on the controversy.
He’s ambivalent on the matter of whether or not Google should be scanning their users’ photos. He wonders if the harm that child pornography does to children justifies Google’s spying on people. He’s not sure. I am: nothing justifies the spying and the argument that child pornography does is too easily extended to other public safety issues and eventually to any reason at all.
Thompson is sure of one thing: Google should have restored the user’s account and files and he’s astounded that they haven’t. It’s hard to understand why not. Perhaps they’re afraid of admitting guilt in case there’s future legal action.
In every story like this the apologists always say that Google or whoever is, after all, a private company and they can do as they like as long as it’s not illegal. Google, Facebook, Twitter, Apple, and the other big players have worked hard to become essential utilities and they’ve largely succeeded. But if they want to be like the electric or telephone utilities then they should operate under the same sorts of rules. Yes, they are private companies but they have civic responsibilities. They shouldn’t be able, for example, to refuse service to someone because they don’t like what they say or do as long as it’s legal. It’s time to stop letting these companies have it both ways.