New York — In an effort to reinforce trust with its users, search engine pioneer Yahoo! Inc. has thrown down the gauntlet to bitter rivals Google and Microsoft yesterday by revamping its global data retention policy the shortest among peers, promising to anonymize the personal data of Web users to 90 days from the previous 13 months, half the period stipulated by the EU, the company said on Wednesday.
“According to the new policy, Yahoo! will anonymize user log data within 90 days with limited exceptions for fraud, security and legal obligations,” Yahoo! said in a move it said “sets an industry-leading approach to user data privacy.”
Significantly, Yahoo has also expanded the scope of the data that is covered by its new privacy policy to include information about which websites its users visit and the adverts they see and click on.
Yahoo! said the new policy will “be applicable not only to search log data but also page views, page clicks, ad views and ad clicks.”
“This new policy reinforces Yahoo!’s relationship of trust with its 500 million users around the world and enhances its longtime leadership on privacy,” the Sunnyvale, California, Internet company said in a statement.
“In our world of customized online services, responsible use of data is critical to establishing and maintaining user trust,” said Anne Toth, vice president of policy and head of privacy at Yahoo.
“We know that our users expect relevant and compelling content and advertising when they visit Yahoo, but they also want assurances that we are focused on protecting their privacy.”
“This policy describes Yahoo!’s assessment of the minimum amount of time we need to preserve data in order to respond to the needs of our business while deepening our trusted relationship with users,” Toth said.
Yahoo! and other Internet firms have come under increasing pressure from US privacy activists and regulators, including the European commission, to cut the amount of time they keep search and other data associated with a user’s unique Internet address.
Web search titan Google reduced the period to nine months from 18 months in September while arch-rival Microsoft, the US software behemoth, said this month that it was ready to cut down the time to six months from the current 18 months if other Internet firms agreed to do so.
As the internet plays an important role in people’s work and personal lives, so the information retained about them has become more and more valuable.
For the search engines, tracking what each people have looked for empowers them to provide more relevant results when they search again. The information can also be used to target adverts at them more accurately.
According to Yahoo, the move follows a detailed review of its data practices across the globe working with privacy and data governance teams to examine the data needs for global products and services.
The company believes the new limit will still allow it to provide the same level of service to users and advertisers while maintaining the ability to fight fraud, secure systems, and meet legal obligations.
Microsoft welcomed Yahoo!’s move on Wednesday but stated that what is more essential than the time-frame was how search engines go about making a user’s personal data anonymous.
“Microsoft believes all major players in the market should move to effective privacy practices and welcomes Yahoo!’s steps on search anonymization following Microsoft’s call for an industry standard last week,” said Brendon Lynch, Microsoft’s director of privacy strategy.
“Microsoft believes that the method of anonymization is more important than the anonymization timeframe and believes all major search engines need to adopt a high standard,” he added in a statement.
Yahoo will enforce the switch next year, but it is unlikely to be in place across all its global operations until 2010.