Google Calls For Global Privacy Standards

Google Calls For Global Privacy Standards

Google takes a lot of heat from the European Union over its privacy standards. Now the company is taking its turn to speechify.

This morning, Google's Global Privacy Counsel Peter Fleischer took the stage at a European regional meeting on the "ethical dimensions of the information society," organized by the French Commission of the UNESCO, to call for international privacy standards.

"The majority of the world's countries offer virtually no privacy standards to their citizens and businesses," Fleischer later wrote in a blog post calling for international privacy standards that are "clear and strong, mindful of commercial realities, and in line with oftentimes divergent political needs."

Now is the time for such standards, Fleischer writes, because of accelerating globalization, technological innovation and concern over personal privacy.

Search rivals Ask and Microsoft called for industry-wide standards in July.

As a workable model for international standards, however, Fleischer cites the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Privacy Framework.

The APEC Privacy Framework, according to the organization's Web site, is built on nine principles: preventing harm, integrity of personal information, notice, security safeguards, collection limitations, access and correction, uses of personal information, accountability and choice.

Fleischer said the framework appeals to Google because it balances business needs and commercial interests. And unlike other international privacy standards, as well as the OECD guidelines and the European Directive, the APEC Privacy Framework was developed in the "Internet age."

A Google spokesperson told InternetNews.com the company does not mean to endorse specific privacy standards, such as APEC's, but to advocate a "clear strong workable practice."

In June, Google responded to pressure from the European Union over privacy concerns by agreeing to anonymize its search server logs after 18 months. Previously, Google held onto user search data for as long as 24 months, a length of time the company decided on in reaction to past European Union (EU) concerns.

By Nicholas Carlson
Keyword : Google Calls For Global Privacy Standards

Sun, Microsoft Deal Presents Opportunities And Risks For VARs

Sun, Microsoft Deal Presents Opportunities And Risks For VARs

Sun Microsystems' agreement to start OEMing Microsoft's Windows Server 2003 operating system as an option for its x86 servers opens the doors to new opportunities for Sun's channel, but runs the risk of further commoditizing Sun's hardware.

The move, which the two vendors unveiled yesterday, comes less than a month after IBM said it will expand its support for Sun's Solaris operating on it x86 server line.

The two events solidify the fact that x86 server hardware, including the servers from Sun, have become commodity products, said Mike Thompson, president of Groupware Technology and Computing, a Campbell, Calif.-based Sun solution provider.

"In the long run, most people who buy Sun hardware will run Solaris," Thompson said. "But we can now go into a Sun house and offer Microsoft. But on the flip side, IBM partners will be in Sun shops selling Solaris."

It is nice to see Sun formalize something that was already happening, said Rob Wolfe, president and CEO of AvcomEast, a Vienna, Va.-based Sun solution provider.

"People are already loading Windows on Sun x86 servers because they are great servers," Wolfe said. "It's nice to see the commodity operating system on commodity Sun servers."

On the other hand, Wolfe said, he really does not want customers to see another operating system as an alternative to Solaris, which he called the best operating system in terms of value, performance, and security.

"As a Sun partner, we will need to work harder to talk to customers about the strength of the Solaris platform," he said.

Sun solution providers do see new opportunities to compete against other industry-standard server vendors using Windows and Sun hardware.

Donna Regan, director of marketing at Regan Technologies, a Wallingford, Conn.-based Sun solution provider, said she expects the combination to let her company be able to displace Hewlett-Packard or Dell servers with some customers.

However, this does not mean she expects to become the sole provider of servers to customers with mixed environments.

"Customers like to keep multiple vendors around," Regan said. "Obviously, we'd like to be the only one in there. But customers like a little competition. Most of the time, customers are not looking for a single throat to choke. What I think they are looking for is someone to help them with cross-platform applications."

Wolfe said he expects new opportunities to sell Sun servers to customers his company had not been able to reach before. "Customers have racks and racks of servers running Windows," he said. "This gives us credibility as a multi-platform provider."

Sun customers already know that Sun is serious about servers, Wolfe said. "The fact that they have the option to get servers from Sun with any operating system is pretty cool," he said.

Kip Lindberg, vice president of enterprise sales at Ncell Systems, a Minnetonka, Minn.-based Sun solution provider, said he sees the opportunity to go to customers who are outside the areas where they can get the best service from HP or other server vendors.

"I can go in and say, 'Here, you aren't getting the support you need,'" Lindberg said. "So there's a possibility we could have some Sun/Microsoft sales."

However, Lindberg said, he is not expecting a huge new increase in sales from Sun servers with Windows. "My customers aren't going to all of a sudden say, gee, I'll buy my Windows from Sun," he said. "They already have a half-a-dozen other vendors in there."

The Sun/Microsoft agreement also signals the beginning of a new move to virtualize the data center, solution providers said.
Regan Technologies already working a lot with virtualization on the x86 server platform, Donna Regan said. "Having Microsoft will be a big plus for us for virtualization."

Lindberg said the combination does look interesting as one watches how the server blade and virtualization markets grow. "Once you get into blades, and truly virtualize it all, then you could get into a computing-agnostic platform," he said. "If companies like this start to play together in the sandbox, maybe we'll finally get to the utility computing concept we've been talking about for years."

By Joseph F. Kovar, CMP Channel
Keyword : Sun, Microsoft Deal Presents Opportunities And Risks For VARs