The Company Whose Motto Is ‘Don’t Be Evil’, Is Turning Into An Evil [Special]

How do you relate to Google? Do you know them as the world’s favorite search engine? As the noun that became a verb? Or as the company whose motto is – Don’t Be Evil? probably all of them. We believe that Google is forsaking its motto to keep ahead of its competition and further strengthen its advertising empire. With this report we intend to give you some pointers as to why Google is turning into an Evil.

Ever since Google co-founder Larry Page has taken over from former CEO Eric Schmidt, Google’s focus seems to be shifting towards the one area where Google has fallen behind its competition Facebook – The Social Internet.

Ever since its inception in 2004 Facebook has had access to data of millions of people, Facebook knows about your interests, your relationship status, it basically knows a hell lot of more about you then some of your close friends do. Don’t believe us? Think about it, do you like rock bands, have you ever liked, commented, updated about a rock band or a Rockstar? If you have then chances are that Facebook has recommended you to subscribe to another Rockstar, or it has offered you an ad that would let you download videos, songs of your favorite music album, and you wouldn’t know that you were shown that data because it was analyzed time and again to bring the best possible result to you, one that you would at least click on once. That’s how advertising works, and no one does that better than Google, after all the more than 97% of Google’s revenue comes from ads. So how exactly is Google turning into an Evil?

Let us show you how. Here are 10 facts about what Google does for a living, and how Google OWNS you:

1. Google processes 1 billion web searches everyday using around 900,000 servers but it’s more than just a search engine.
2. Google owns your e-mail (Gmail), your phone (Android), your computer (Google Chrome), and your entire digital life (Blogger, Picasa, Maps, Docs etc.), whatever you want to do online Google wants to own it.
3. Do you know that Google whose market value is $200 billion launched a venture capital arm to invest in industries as diverse as Software, Biotech, Health Care and other areas that you probably haven’t even thought of.
4. Google owns your entertainment (YouTube), your personalized news(Google News).
5. Google wants to build the largest library ever (Google Books search).
6. Google practically knows where everything is from your garage (Google Earth), the Moon (Google Moon) all the way up to Mars (Google Mars) .
7. Google tracks you, it stores records of everything you do online for 18 months.
8. Google wants access to your health records and hold your breath it wants access to your DNA, having invested in Genetic Testing Companies (Navigenics, 23 and Me).
9. Google follows you friendships (Google Plus, Google Buzz, Orkut).
10. Google Maps and Google Earth have been widely criticized for publishing photos of naked kids, people vomiting and naming Sex Shops.

When Google Buzz and other services were engulfed in privacy breaches, the then Google CEO Eric Schmidt had said –

“If You have something that you don’t want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn’t be doing it in the first place”

Which essentially means if you don’t want Google to use your kid’s naked pics for selling baby diapers, don’t ever upload the photo on the Internet.

So the big question is Why does Google want to know so much about you? And what does it intend to do with all that info and data about you? In Eric Schmidt’s words – “Google is an Advertising Company”, need we say any more?

In the last one year, under Larry Page whose top priority seems to have become “Revolutionizing Sharing” through Google Plus, Google’s entire focus has been on gathering information about its users in order to effectively target ads at them. The fact is that Google Plus and other social networking features introduced since Page took over allows the company to learn more about its users’ lives, just as Facebook has done for years on its online hangout. Now, Google can try to use some of that knowledge to sell more ads, the source of virtually all its revenue.

“Larry is driven by his paranoia about Facebook. Clearly, these are two companies at war with each other,” – Ken Auletta, Author of – Googled: The End of the world as we know it.

Some of Google’s tactics to fend off Facebook have been interpreted as signs that Google is turning into a ruthless company willing to go to any length to protect its core business.

Finally here is more concrete proof why Google is turning Evil :

• Last month Google unified 60 different privacy policies so it could stitch together all the personal information it gathers while users are logged into most of its services. They of course explained it as an approach that would benefit their users, later on sheepishly admitting to the true reason behind the move that it would let them draw a more meaningful profile for advertisers looking to connect with prospective customers.

• A research by a Stanford graduate published in February exposed how the company had been bypassing the security settings in Apple’s Safari browser for iPhones and iPads to track Web surfers’ online activities. Google disabled the tracking after it was revealed.

• Google also tweaked its search results in January to give users the option to highlight results from Google Plus. And then began to include suggestions on people to follow on Google Plus while excluding recommendations for Facebook and Twitter’s messaging service, both of which are used more widely than Google Plus. Google says its search engine can’t pull enough information from Facebook and Twitter  to provide the same recommendations as it does for Google Plus, which is comical to say the least.

Our intention is to bring to your notice the facts which are hidden from the public eye, we will let you decide for yourselves if Google has indeed turned into an Evil.