Google will stop mining data from Apps for Education for ad data collection purposes

By Konrad Krawczyk Published April 30, 2014

Google announced today that users of Apps for Education, which offers student and teacher-centric versions of Gmail, Calender, Documents, and other familiar services, will no longer have their Gmail accounts scanned for advertisement data purposes. Bram Bout, Google’s Director for Education, announced the move on this official blog post.

On top of that, Bout also revealed that Google has permanently removed the option to enable or disable ads in the administrator console for Apps for Education. Now, ads in all Apps for Education services are automatically turned off for good, and there’s no option to turn them back on again. However, there is a caveat:

Recommended Videos

“Users who have chosen to show AdSense ads on their Google Sites will still have the ability to display those existing ads on their websites. However, it will no longer be possible to edit or add new AdSense ads to existing sites or to new pages,” Bout says.

External factors may have played a part in Google’s decision to make this move, though. A lawsuit brought forth against Google by students and Gmail users claimed that the company’s account scanning practices violated wiretapping laws, The Wall Street Journal reports. Also, Education Week claims that these practices may violate the Family Education Rights and Privacy Act, which was enacted in 1974.

Bout also says that Google will be “making similar changes for all our Google Apps customers, including Business, Government and for legacy users of the free version.” When the company completes the rollout of these changes, they’ll announce an additional update.

In case you’re interested in discussing these policy tweaks with Google execs, they’ll be hosting a Hangout on their Google for Education Google Plus page tomorrow, May 1, at 9:00 am PT. Hank Thiele, the CTO for High School District 207 located in Park Ridge, IL, who employs Google Apps, will also be on hand to represent the education sector. Bout will be present, and joined by Jonathan Rochelle, who is the Director of Product Management for Google Docs and Google Drive.

Konrad Krawczyk

Former Computing Editor

Konrad covers desktops, laptops, tablets, sports tech and subjects in between for Digital Trends. Prior to joining DT, he…

Topics

Computing

Google makes Gemini’s AI avatars social, so friends can now appear in each other’s content

Google Gemini lets you share your AI likeness with friends, tag each other in prompts, and star together in generated videos.

Google is making Gemini's personal AI avatars more social, letting you share your likeness with friends and appear together in AI-generated images and videos. You can share your avatar, tag friends in prompts, and create content featuring everyone's digital likeness.

https://twitter.com/GeminiApp/status/2115885244805251519

Computing

Subvocal’s glasses promise to let you talk to your computer in complete silence

Voice dictation is incredibly convenient, but talking to your computer in public can be embarrassing. Subvocal thinks it has a solution.

Subvocal smart glasses use radar to track your mouth movement and convert it to text using AI

Typing has always been a bottleneck between what we think and how quickly we can communicate it to a computer. AI-powered dictation tools like Wispr Flow have made things considerably better. You can practically ramble your way through an entire email, or even an article, and have it transcribed into text in seconds.

But there's a rather awkward problem with talking to your computer. Try doing it in a quiet office, a library, or even your favorite cafe, and more often than not, you tend to attract some attention or end up disturbing others. A startup called The Subvocal Company thinks it has found a solution to this issue. It has developed a pair of smart glasses that promise to turn silent mouth movements into text at over 200 words per minute.

Computing

North Korean hackers pull off a $6.3 billion crypto heist in one of the biggest thefts so far

Cryptocurrency issuers and networks froze approximately $2.7 billion, the remaining stolen assets pose a major challenge.

binance-crypto-theft

North Korean hackers have stolen a staggering $6.36 billion in cryptocurrency from Binance, according to blockchain intelligence firm TRM Labs. On October 29 the attack reportedly drained funds across 10 different blockchains in roughly 20 minutes. TRM attributes the operation to TraderTraitor, a North Korean state-sponsored hacking group.

How did hackers steal $6.3 billion from Binance?