Apparently Google’s Gmail users don’t necessarily have the legal rights to the full privacy they might expect.
“Just as a sender of a letter to a business colleague cannot be surprised that the recipient’s assistant opens the letter, people who use web-based email today cannot be surprised if their communications are processed by the recipient’s ECS (Electronic Communications Service) provider in the course of delivery,” Google’s legal brief stated.
Google brief goes on to note that “… as numerous courts have held the automated processing of email is so widely understood and accepted that the act of sending an email constitutes implied consent to automated processing as a matter of law.”
Read the full story at eWeek:
Scroogled Redux: Google, Gmail, Privacy and You
Sean Michael Kerner is a senior editor at InternetNews.com. Follow him on Twitter @TechJournalist.