AOL is in the news for the wrong reasons this time -- a privacy scandal.
A few weeks ago a new strategy for AOL surfaced -- where the company would focus on advertising revenue with free content and services rather than subcription revenue and paid services (by providing internet connections). This would make AOL more like Yahoo Inc. (YHOO). A lot of interest and speculation started.
However, in the first week of August, AOL released search related data of more than 65,000 AOL users for connecting with the Information Retrieval and Academic Community. In a few days, AOL has called this data release a "screw-up" and acknowledged that the data release was "obviously not appropriately vetted ". Is AOL's self-critical apology enough I wonder.
What takes an Internet company to realize that we are not having a fun shouting party when voicing privacy concerns. What takes a big Internet media company to put in place processes and people who would understand the seriousness of data that the company collects?
Continued... AOL's moment of Shame
