Senator moves to block Gmail
13 April 2004
Google's free email service could be blocked in California under draft legislation being drawn up by a US Senator.
Democratic Senator Liz Figueroa has called Gmail "an invasion of privacy" and is opposing plans by the search giant to scan personal messages for advertising key words.
"We think it's an absolute invasion of privacy. It's like having a massive billboard in the middle of your home," Ms Figueroa, from Fremont, California, "We are asking them to rethink the whole product."
Ms Figueroa, author of California's 'Do-Not-Call' law which allows consumers to block telemarketing calls, said she was pursuing the legislation because she had not yet received a response to a letter sent to Google founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page on April 8th.
"We received the letter from Senator Figueroa. We appreciate her feedback and will take it into consideration as we build the best possible webmail service for our users," Google said in a statement.
Google announced plans to launch Gmail last month. The new service will offer users one gigabyte of free storage, over 100 times the storage offered by other free services such as Yahoo and Hotmail. However emails will be scanned for targeted adverts and all messages will be permanently stored by Google.
UK-based campaign group Privacy International has already complained to the UK's Information Commissioner about Gmail. European data protection legislation gives users full control over their own communications.
Google insists that messages will be scanned by computer only and no one will be reading customers' private emails. The company has announced that it intends to work with data protection authorities in order to allay concerns.
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