Google tip aids in arrest of alleged sex offender. How often does Google help cops?

A cyber-tip from Google helped authorities arrest a Houston man who was allegedly sending pornographic images of a young girl via his Gmail account. 

|
Staff

Google aided in the arrest of a Houston man who allegedly used Gmail to send images of child pornography, KHOU 11 News reports.

The search giant reportedly generated a cyber-tip that was then sent to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children

John Henry Skillern is identified as a registered sex offender who was caught sending "explicit images of a young girl" in an e-mail to a friend, according to the report. 

Investigators obtained a warrant and then allegedly found substantial evidence of pornographic material on Mr. Skillern's electronic devices, including his phone and tablet, according to the report. 

"He was trying to get around getting caught, he was trying to keep it inside his email," detective David Nettles of the Houston Metro Internet Crimes Against Children Taskforce, told KHOU. "I can't see that information, I can't see that photo, but Google can."

Skillern is being held on a $200,000 bond, according to the report. 

This case provides an illuminating example of Google's power to aid authorities in law enforcement. What once might have been private photographs are now being sent across servers monitored by Google.

And yet, it also fuels the controversy over Google's practice of scanning users' e-mails in order to target them with ads. 

"Our automated systems analyze your content (including emails) to provide you personally relevant product features, such as customized search results, tailored advertising, and spam and malware detection," Google states in its Terms of Service. "This analysis occurs as the content is sent, received, and when it is stored." But as The BBC reported, those terms were updated after a class-action lawsuit was dismissed earlier this year over e-mail scanning. 

Still, Google's role in policing compels the question among privacy advocates as to when it decides to take action on illicit content that crosses its servers. 

In its Privacy Policy, Google lists a series of legal reasons that require it to share users' information with outside parties. Among those reasons, Google explains that it shares information in order to "protect against harm to the rights, property or safety of Google, our users or the public as required or permitted by law."

Last year, Google's director of giving, Jacquelline Fuller, wrote a blog post in which she outlined Google's commitment to stopping the spread of child pornography on the Web. 

"We’re in the business of making information widely available, but there’s certain “information” that should never be created or found," she wrote. "We can do a lot to ensure it’s not available online—and that when people try to share this disgusting content they are caught and prosecuted."

However, there are forms of illegal activity that do not get scanned by Google in Gmail accounts, "such as pirated content or hate speech," according to The BBC. 

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

QR Code to Google tip aids in arrest of alleged sex offender. How often does Google help cops?
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/Technology/Horizons/2014/0804/Google-tip-aids-in-arrest-of-alleged-sex-offender.-How-often-does-Google-help-cops
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe