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Japan expresses concern over Google's new privacy policy

In a letter to Google, the Japanese government have raised concerns over the newly launched privacy policy, which it thinks may be in breach of Japanese data protection laws.
Written by Hana Stewart-Smith, Contributor

The government of Japan has expressed concern over Google's new privacy policy, instated today.

Authorities contacted Google to raise concerns over the way in which it intends to store and use data from users. They suggested that the policy might be in breach of Japan's data protection laws.

In a letter, they asked Google to prepare a clear explanation of just how the new rules will impact users, and to be ready to respond to any inquiries promptly.

Google's new privacy policy is intended to encapsulate all of its previous policies into a single, main policy to cover all of its services. This means they will consolidate all of a users data from across Google's services into one place, allowing content to be customised to them.

The intention is to make things simpler and more transparent, but that isn't how everyone sees the change. Unsurprisingly this has raised some flags from concerned web browsers over just how their private data is being observed and put to use.

Although you can delete your Internet history, that doesn't mean it is necessarily permanently erased.

The policy states: "Because of the way we maintain certain services, after you delete your information, residual copies may take a period of time before they are deleted from our active servers and may remain in our backup systems."

Japan is not the only country that has taken issue with the new policy. In February, authorities in South Korea launched an investigation over the possibility of the policy breaching its domestic laws.

In Europe there were calls to suspend the introduction of the policy so it could be ensured that it did not breach European data protection laws. Google declined to delay the launch of the new policy, and an investigation has since been launched.

Google, meanwhile, is hoping to reassure customers that the new policy is not a cause for concern. In a post on its official blog released today, it stated "it's the same Google you're used to, with the same controls."

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