Very Interesting

Google watch.

Don't be evil.

Among other interesting links from this page:

...The CIA had to stop using a comparatively innocent log-analysis cookie that expired in 10 years, and their document search site isn't even used by many people. Google handles 200 million searches per day, and their cookie expires in 2038. One of Google's leading software engineers, Matt Cutts, had a top-secret clearance and used to work for the National Security Agency. Google doesn't even feel the need to defend their cookie policy; they merely laugh off anyone who inquires about it.

A cult of geeky blogging Google pundits joins in, and ridicules the notion that you'll be using the same computer in 2038. That's not the point. Google's expiration date is a barometer of its insensitivity to privacy issues. When we noticed this in year 2000 (it was the first time we had ever seen such a long-lived cookie), the idea of Google Watch was born. Google's response to other privacy issues since then tells us that we were right.

The purpose of the unique ID is to record your search terms for present or future profiling. Google says that the cookie is needed to set preferences. At the CIA, Google's cookie story would be termed a cover story, because the unique ID is completely superfluous for this function, even when the rest of the cookie is used to do this. In fact, you can set preferences without any sort of cookie at all...