Google apologizes for a software bug that resulted in some users' personal videos being emailed to strangers. The flaw affected users of Google Photos who requested to export their data in some time in November 2019.
Google Photos exported wrongly attached videos to strangers
The export tool wrongly added videos to unrelated clients' archives for four days. Private videos might have been sent to strangers as a result, while downloaded files might not be completed.
A Google spokesperson said they had notified the public on a computer bug that could have affected customers who used Google Takeout to export their Google Photos content between November 21 and November 25.
These users, according to Google, may also have obtained both an incomplete archive, or videos - not photos - that have been not theirs. "We are fixing the underlying difficulty and have conducted an in-depth evaluation to help save you this from ever going on again," Google added.
The company emphasized that the bug only affected customers of Google Takeout and not customers of Google Photos more broadly. It did not give precise numbers on what number of customers had been changed but stated it become less than 0.01 percent of Google Photos customers.
Google Takeout is a tool intended to download copies of the user's data from cloud-hosted services such as email or storage of photos and videos. Takeout wants to provide people with an easy way to free their personal data from online services.
Google self-reported itself to the Irish records protection commissioner, who manages the company in the EU and has the electricity to levy fines of up to four percent of annual turnover for violations of the General Data Protection Regulation.
Data security advocate lauds Google for its quick response, but...
Javvad Malik, a security awareness advocate at KnowBe4, commended Google for the pace of its response on the issue. However, Malik said videos incorrectly shared while downloading an archive means data breach and could affect the privacy of users.
Malik said many users consider cloud providers, especially for pictures and films that are robotically subsidized from cellular devices. Cloud providers, according to Malik, must "preserve their client's" trust through secure, safety features that permit users to restore their statistics while ensuring statistics are kept safe from accidental or malicious leaks.
Google Photos offers unlimited cloud storage of images, with the trade-off that Google has access to the photos and might use them for further research.
Google Photos commenced its testing service in North America. where users may have 10 of their photos every month chosen algorithmically, printed, and sent right in their doorsteps for $8 (£6.15) a month.
Google revealed its quarterly income on Monday and disclosed for the first time how much sales it makes from YouTube advertising. The video-sharing site raised more than $1 billion a month last year, Google stated.
