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Gmail Requires The Least Personal Info
WebProNews
Staff Writer
2004-04-09
 Insider Reports RSS Feed
A review by Fury 3.2 of what personal information MSN, Yahoo, and Google require for email membership was revealing.
Kevin Fox, publisher of Fury.com, and user interface designer at Google, was kind enough to do this comparison and post his findings on his blog. What he discovered about personal information was interesting.
Yahoo requires the members First Name, Last Name, Zip code, Gender, Industry, Job Title, Specialization, Birth Date, and a check box for special offers from selected Yahoo partners that is checked by default.
MSN/Hotmail requires First Name, Last Name, Language, Country, State, Zip Code, Time Zone, Gender, Birth Date, Occupation, which of 40 newsletters you want to receive in your inbox, and which of 55 topics interest you, so that 'featured offers' from Hotmail partners can be delivered into your inbox.
That's a nice amount of information that these two ask for. Google asks for First Name and Last Name. That's all. Yahoo states that they ask for this information to provide 3rd parties for targeted advertising.
Google, on the other hand, has no intention of renting, selling, or sharing information about Gmail members. They intend to place contextually targeted ads in emails themselves.
Gmail has been hammered relentlessly since they announced this practice, although, the difference between Gmail's ads and Yahoo providing 3rd parties with member information is huge. While it's true that Google may scan and retain member emails, it will not resell any member information to any outside companies, AdSense/AdWords client or not. Yahoo, on the other hand, does.
The question should be asked: why does Google get negative press for their email practices, but Yahoo does not?
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