EU widens Google privacy probe to other sites

A European Union probe triggered by concerns over how long Google Inc. stores user information has widened to include all Internet search engines.

The EU’s panel of national data protection officers said it was concerned over the retention of data that the companies use to deliver more relevant search results and advertising. Some fear that the data could be used by hackers and governments.

“This issue affects an ever-growing number of users,” the panel said in a statement Thursday.

Trying to soothe EU concerns, Google this month offered to cut the time it retained data on user searches from the current 24 months to 18 months, saying this was going further than most other search engines.

It insists that its retention policies comply with EU data-privacy rules.

The 28-member panel, which advises the European Commission and EU governments on data-protection issues, said it still needed to analyze Google’s response and would also look at other search engines in the coming weeks to evaluate what data-protection issues were at stake.

It also has asked Google to answer questions on the specific use of technologies used by Google and other websites to collect insights about what sites people visit.

The investigation comes amid growing concerns over the Mountain View, Calif.-based company’s privacy practices.

London-based Privacy International has rated Google the worst on privacy among the Internet’s top destinations.

The watchdog said it was particularly troubled by Google’s ability to match data gathered by its search engine with information collected from other services such as e-mail, instant messaging and maps.