None of your business

When you grow up in a family with six kids and share a bedroom with three of them, you have no expectation of privacy. A closed door was like an open invitation to find out what one sibling was trying to hide. Growing up like that, I find I have less expectation of privacy but an increased resentment of intrusions into areas that I regard as private. So while I can maybe choke down a little domestic spying in the interests of finding terrorists, the idea of the government snooping into what I search for on the Internet really sticks in my craw.

What am I talking about? The Feds recently ordered Google to disclose every search request it received over the course of a week and for a random sample of 1 million Web pages that can be searched by Google. Why do they want this? Because for several years they've been trying to pass the Child Online Protection Act which would make it illegal for a commercial Web site to post material that some might find "harmful" should a child stumble on it, and they apparently hope to establish the need for such a broadly defined law by showing how often pornography turns up in Internet searches.

Now I'm no more worried about being caught in the Google search than I am being linked to terrorists (though I must admit to some concern that the way my Chinese surname is spelled is, coincidentally, also a Pakistani name), but as a businessman I have two main concerns. The first is that permitting this kind of fishing expedition by Feds will encourage others to do the same and create a potentially crushing burden on businesses. If you've ever had to produce documents pursuant to a lawsuit, you know what I mean; and if you haven't, think about what a hassle it is just to gather records to prepare your tax returns or for an annual audit and then multiply that by several year's worth and then by the number of other areas someone interested in learning your business would want to see.

The second is that it will discourage people from sharing information on the Web for fear that it will expose them to legal liability of some kind. I doubt there is a person reading this column who hasn't used an Internet search engine to obtain information of some kind and therefore already knows what an extraordinary research tool it is. Imagine the Feds being able to track your Internet searches and on that basis putting you on a watch list for potential antitrust or export control violations. Would that make you think twice about surfing the Net?

Ironically, as many people were applauding Google for fighting this subpoena, others were condemning it for also having recently acceded to the wishes of the Chinese government by making its Chinese version of Google self-censoring so that Chinese users cannot gain access to certain info their government doesn't want them to see. Of course, the Chinese do not have a Bill of Rights like we do. Still, is there much difference between one government telling Google what searches to allow and another telling it to disclose what searches its users are conducting?

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