An expose of bad businesses and their unethical practices

Hey, ever wonder what other people are searching for on the Internet? How would you feel if anyone and everyone could figure out what YOU were searching for on the Internet? Well, AOL , part of Time-Warner, (NYSE TWX) helped answer both these questions recently, by going ahead and publishing subscriber's searches - for all the world to see. It was this lapse in judgment that led to the ouster of two employees and a resignation from the CTO.

It seems some dim-wit thought that revealing such data (using numbers to represent individual subscribers rather than names) would assist with research. Now, granted, search term marketing is big, legitimate business. The only problem with the way AOL went about it is that search terms were grouped by subscriber number. Since many people search for things that reveal a lot about themselves (their own name, social security number, employer, hobby interest, medical info, porn interests etc.), it was easy for one paper to quickly track down a particular string of search terms to identify their "owner."

AOl released the data intentionally, and only took it down when they realized it was not a shrewd move. By then, some people had already saved the entire database and reposted elsewhere. One link refers to the opportunity to view people's search terms as "hours of fun."

You see, its easy enough to find out what searches are popular. The difference here is that you can take a look at one individual, one person's computer and discover that at one moment they may be looking for "ways to volunteer with the Red Cross" and then, a short while later, look for "nude teenagers." In essence, AOL published people's individual "stories" as revealed by their AOL search terms. Hours of fun? Only for the very bored, but a serious breach nonetheless.