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Dire predictions of Google CEO

Eric Schmidt The extent to which we are giving away too much information online is something that Big Brother Watch has written about on several occasions.

But when the CEO of Google, Eric Schmidt, says the following to the Wall Street Journal, it really is time to sit up and listen:

He predicts, apparently seriously, that every young person one day will be entitled automatically to change his or her name on reaching adulthood in order to disown youthful hijinks stored on their friends' social media sites…

"I don't believe society understands what happens when everything is available, knowable and recorded by everyone all the time… I mean we really have to think about these things as a society."

Undoubtedly we need to educate children (and many adults for that matter!) on the value of privacy. But with social networking growing in scope and popularity, the real question is – can we put pandora back in her box?

By Dylan Sharpe

Posted on August 17, 2010 by Big Brother Watch Posted in Online privacy
  • http://stravagantisimo.blogspot.com/ Hugh Bicheno

    Umm – Pandora’s box contained all the evils of the world, but not Pandora herself!

  • http://profile.typepad.com/glenslade Glenslade

    A couple of pointers for Eric Schmidt:
    1. It is already a legal right to change your name (and/or have multiple online aliases).
    2. Your name is not the same thing as your identity. Social networking technology means that unless you also change your appearance, your address and your friends/family, then you’ll quickly be tracked back to your indelible “hijinks”.

  • Redacted

    Maybe he actually wants regulation of some sort in the hope it will restrain Google’s even more voracious competitors because Google is in danger of losing out as online activity that Google can’t index continues to increase.
    http://www.wired.com/magazine/2010/08/ff_webrip/