Criticisms
[edit] Privacy
Google automatically scans e-mails to add context-sensitive advertisements to them. Privacy advocates raised concerns that the plan involved scanning their personal, assumed private, e-mails, and that this was a security problem. Allowing e-mail content to be read, even by a computer, raises the risk that the expectation of privacy in e-mail will be reduced. Furthermore, e-mail that non-subscribers choose to send to Gmail accounts is scanned by Gmail as well, even though those senders never agreed to Gmail's terms of service or privacy policy. Google can change its privacy policy unilaterally and Google is technically able to cross-reference cookies across its information-rich product line to make dossiers on individuals. However, most e-mail systems make use of server-side content scanning in order to check for spam.[49][50]
Privacy advocates also regard the lack of disclosed data retention and correlation policies as problematic. Google has the ability to combine information contained in a person's e-mail messages with information from Internet searches. Google has not confirmed how long such information is kept or how it can be used. One of the concerns is that it could be of interest to law enforcement agencies. More than 30 privacy and civil liberties organizations have urged Google to suspend Gmail service until these issues are resolved.[51]
Gmail's privacy policy contains the clause: "residual copies of deleted messages and accounts may take up to 60 days to be deleted from our active servers and may remain in our offline backup systems". Google points out that Gmail adheres to most industry-wide practices. Google has stated that they will "make reasonable efforts to remove deleted information from our systems as quickly as is practical."[52][53]
Google defends its position by citing their use of email-scanning to the user's benefit. Google states that Gmail refrains from displaying ads next to potentially sensitive messages such as those that mention tragedy, catastrophe, or death.[54]
Gmail accounts of human rights activists in China were hacked in a sophisticated attack in late 2009.[55][56] The fact that Gmail stores, analyzes and retains user's email contents makes Gmail an attractive target for such attacks.[57]
The launch of Google Buzz as an opt-out social network immediately drew criticism for violating user privacy because it automatically allowed Gmail users' contacts to view their other contacts.[58][59]
[edit] Technical limitations
Gmail does not allow users to send or receive executable files or archives containing executable files if it recognises the file extension as one used for executable files or archives.[60][61]
By design, Gmail does not deliver all of a user's e-mails. When downloading mail through POP or IMAP access, Gmail fails to deliver messages that users have sent to themselves if the client has a copy of it already.[62] It also does not deliver to a user's inbox (via any access interface) those messages that users have sent to mailing lists and which they might expect to receive back via the mailing list.[63]
Gmail sorts e-mail only by conversations (threads), which can be a problem for large conversations. For example, if a user sends a query to a large group of people, all of the responses are stored in a single conversation that is impossible to break apart. There is no way to search for responses from one user without getting the entire conversation. While deletion of individual e-mails is possible, most operations, such as archiving and labeling, can only be performed on whole conversations. Conversations cannot be split up or combined.[64]
[edit] Outages
Gmail has been unavailable on several occasions. On February 24, 2009 the Gmail service was offline for 2 hours and 30 minutes, preventing millions of users from accessing their accounts. People who rely entirely on Gmail for business purposes complained about these outages.[65][66] Another outage occurred on September 1, 2009. The problem was widely reported by users on Twitter, and Google acknowledged that the problem affects "a majority of users" and promised an update on the situation by 1:53:00PM PDT which would include a time estimate on when they expect to have the problem fixed.[67][68][69] An update at 1:02PM PDT stated that the problem was still being investigated and promised another update by 2:16:00 PM PDT. According to an Official Gmail Blog post, IMAP and POP3 access was unaffected.[70] Later that day, a Google vice president, Ben Treynor, explained that the problem, which ultimately resulted in about 100 minutes of outage, was caused by overloaded routers, triggered by a routine configuration change which added more router load than expected. Treynor wrote, "Gmail remains more than 99.9% available to all users, and we're committed to keeping events like today's notable for their rarity."[71][72]
In 2009, Google continued to experience outages across its network, leaving users without access to their email, calendars, and virtual files.[73]
Key outage dates include:[73]
* September 24, 2009: Gmail outage
* September 1, 2009: Gmail outage
* May 14, 2009: Google network outage
* March 9, 2009: Gmail outage
* August 7, 2008: Gmail and Google Apps outage
[edit] Twenty-four hour lockdowns
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If an algorithm detects what Google calls "suspicious activity", the account can be automatically locked down for 24 hours (possibly less). The user is not told which reason the account was locked down, but only given a list of possible reasons from which the user has to guess (if the reason is even in the list). Possible reasons for an automated 24 hours lockdown include:
* "Multiple instances of your Gmail account opened"
* "Browser-related issues. Please note that if you find your browser continually reloading while attempting to access your inbox, it is likely a browser issue, and it may be necessary to clear your browser's cache and cookies."
* "Receiving, deleting, or popping out large amounts of mail (via POP) in a short period of time" (even if Gmail has features which do so)
* "Sending a large number of undeliverable messages (messages that bounce back)" (spam, possibly using a keylogged name and password)
* "Using third party file-sharing or storing software, or software that automatically logs in to your account and that is not supported by Gmail"
[edit] On behalf of
Prior to July 2009, any email sent through the Gmail interface included the Gmail.com address as the "sender", even if it was sent with a custom email address as "from". For example, an email sent with an external "from" address using Gmail could be displayed to a receiving e-mail client user as From
[email protected] on behalf of
[email protected] (the display used by versions of Microsoft Outlook). By exposing the Gmail address, Google claimed that this would "help prevent mail from being marked as spam".[74] A number of Gmail users complained that this implementation was both a privacy concern and a professionalism problem.[75]
On July 30, 2009, Gmail announced an update to resolve this issue.[76] The updated custom 'From:' feature allows users to send messages from Gmail using a custom SMTP server, instead of Gmail's.[77] However, the issue is still present for users whose custom email address is a second Gmail account, rather than an account on a separate domain.[78]
[edit] Disabling accounts
Google's terms of service allow it to disable customer accounts at any time without warning. Google provides a page for users to complain if an account has been disabled in error, but although some users are able to get their accounts back, for others it often generates no response, and users have no other way to get their accounts returned to them.[79][80][81][82]
