News: New Perils in Hosted Data?

"We're facing a trend where people are being constantly encouraged to store more and more of their data with third parties," says Kevin Bankston, a staff attorney with the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a technology policy watchdog organization. Bankston says the EFF's objection isn't to the trend itself. "To the extent the law keeps up or these things are designed such that the government can't get at your data without you knowing about it, we have no problem with it. But under current law and the design parameters for Search Across Computers, he says, the idea of Google holding copies of documents is "a very frightening thought." Accordingly, the EFF issued a cautionary advisory (http:// www.eff.org/news/archives/2006_02.php#004400) urging consumers not to use Search Across Computers.