Google has been facing serious criticism in the previous months, regarding its various projects and an overall take on policy. Recently, the company made it to the headlines when details about an internal project — to be named Dragonfly — was leaked. This project had to deal with creating a search engine specifically for the users in China, designed in such a way that the browsing data and privacy can be linked to individual people and the data being shared with third-party entities. Now, a previous employee of Google and who was working as a research scientist, has come up against the company.
Jack Poulson, who resigned from Google recently, published a later that is urging lawmakers to look into the Google matter more seriously, especially in regard to the project Dragonfly. In the letter that was addressed to members of the Senate Commerce Committee, Poulson has substantiated the claim. “Dragonfly is part of a broad pattern of unaccountable decision making across the tech industry. It has been made clear, both by word and by action, that the leadership at Google will be clamping down on the types of internal investigation that were necessary to bring Project Dragonfly to light. I would hope that The Committee would help protect the environment needed for future whistleblowers by taking steps to guarantee ethical transparency and oversight across Silicon Valley,” said Poulson in the letter.
Jack Poulson is looking for more transparency on these matters and he wants lawmakers to have a look at a lot of things happening at Google. In the letter, the ex-Googler has also revealed some details about China-focused project Dragonfly and how some components of the project can be harmful to the privacy of the users and against the ethical policy raised by Google. It is clear that Google has not been keeping their best level of transparency regarding the project Dragonfly, especially after it was reported by The Intercept.
