Senate Commerce Committee Leaders Seek Information on Google's Data Privacy Policies

[Press release] Senate Commerce Committee Chairman John Thune (R-SD), Communications Subcommittee Chairman Roger Wicker (R-MS), and Consumer Protection Subcommittee Chairman Jerry Moran (R-KS), in a letter to Alphabet CEO Larry Page, requested information about the privacy policy and practices of Gmail email services offered through subsidiary company Google. The committee’s information request cites a report in the Wall Street Journal that third party application developers, granted access to Gmail accounts by consumers, have used both human employees and automated systems to read user e-mails for a variety of purposes. They wrote, “While we recognize that third party email apps need access to Gmail data to provide various services, and that users consent to much of this access, the full scope of the use of email content and the ease with which developer employees may be able to read personal emails are likely not well understood by most consumers.” The letter requests a response by July 24, 2018.