Google Could Begin Searching Your Desktop’s Local Files

Google has recently filed a patent listing with the USPTO entitled, “Computer Application Data in Search Results” which catalogues search results across the internet, cloud and local storage. This means Google will be able to search through your data and act as a unified search engine. The patent is engineered to replace Windows’ built-in search tool and offer a wide range of results. However, privacy advocates and many consumers will feel quite uneasy if this policy ever comes to fruition.

While users are accepting of Google’s data policy for online searches, I’m not convinced they will allow access to local files so easily. Evidently, people are opting for cloud-storage more and operating systems are eventually going to be a service. Despite this, Google’s reputation around privacy and how it handles sensitive data is quite poor and you have to wonder how an individual’s data will be processed. It’s important to reiterate that, patents are design ideas and not a guarantee that something will be implemented in the future.

Nevertheless, it seems companies are trying to increase user convenience at the expense of privacy. Do you feel comfortable having bank documents, childhood photos and other information as part of a global search and assessable by Google?

Thank you SlashGear for providing us with this information.