Google's Gmail: spook heaven?

The register is running a story calledGoogle's Gmail: spook heaven? on the dangerous precedent that Gmail sets for possible invations of privacy, I don't think it is bad as far as email snooping by goverment agencies is concerned, as that was and is going to happen.

It rasises problems with when exactly is your privacy being compromised, when your email is scanned, or does it take a human conciousness to do it. The story raises the prospect that it might not even be legal in California.

One of the lines of logic followed by the story is that law suits on Gmail could lead to vast reams of private email getting exposed as part of court cases between corporations that themselves have little interest in the mail contents. But will subsequently get poured over by others, such as spammers, and criminals that want to steal identities, with impunity looking for passwords and other personal data.

Gmail finally looks like the case where Google got it wrong, not because of any technological problems, but because they forgot their own rule Do No Evil