Image via Google Public Policy
Google has made some recent updates to their interface, including a more succinct settings menu, as easier way to switch between accounts, and a more visual way of navigating between different services. Analysts have put a variety of potential uses on these changes, ranging from simply updating the graphics to setting the framework for Google +1, the Google social network that may not be as big of a disaster as Buzz. However, the Google Public Policy Blog has given us another potential reason: helping users maintain appropriate anonymity.
In that post, Alma Whitten, Google’s Director of Privacy, talks about the importance of having different approaches to the web. He specifically highlights three approaches. First, you can be unidenitified, providing nothing more than the bear minimum information (your IP Address and Cookies) for the web and search. Google users can choose to be unidentified by simply logging out of their account.
Second, Whitten (if that is his real name) talks about the importance of pseudonyms, especially for those who are activists, have embarassing conditions that they want to get more information about, or for any other reason want a consistent voice without being personally identified. Whitten makes it clear that users are permitted to use a pseudonym when signing up for Google services.
And third, Whitten goes into the value of having an accurate online identifier. Beyond some practical benefits, certain services, such as Google Checkout, simply rely on it, so it has its place too.
The critical thing for Whitten is that users have the ability to choose and that they know which status they’re currently in. For that reason, he states, the recent update puts the name of the account that’s currently active ina more prominent position, and make logging out or switching those account easier and more intuitive than before.
While it doesn’t do much to address the core privacy concerns, or the (sometimes hilariously wild) claims of competing groups like DDG, it is a step toward helping users keep a shield of anonymity, and does make the company stance on pseudonyms especially clear.
[via the Google Public Policy Blog]
