Askcom, the 4th most used search site offers a new privacy tool allowing users to delete search data
By Captain Maverick
Dec 13, 2007 02:25 AM GMT
Ask.com is the fourth most often used search engine and doing everything that they can to compete against Google, Yahoo, and MSN. The newest in the Ask.com arsenal is the ability for users to delete their search data. Take THAT Google, Yahoo and MSN. Ask is attacking from the privacy flank. The new tool, AskEraser is a privacy control that dumps information about users' search queries within just a few hours. This is a far cry from Ask.com's previous data retention policy and those of its rivals the aforementioned Google, Yahoo, and MSN. Google and MSN store the data for 18 months while Yahoo and AOL store it for about 13 months. This allows them to mine the data for keywords to use for more targeted ads to the end user. Of course the user must turn on the AskEraser or Ask will also store the data for 18 months as well. Some privacy advocated believe that 18 months is much too long and that even 13 months is pushing it in that it leaves the data susceptible to leaks or theft by hackers. It is easy to turn on AskEraser just by clicking the link to the tool that appears on the Ask.com home page in the upper right corner. Then simply click the "Turn on AskEraser" tab and you're all set. When enabled, all Ask.com cookies will be deleted from the browser on that user's computer. This also includes the IP address, user ID, and session ID cookies as well as the complete text of all search queries. This all happens within a matter of a few hours.
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