Should be titled the Banality of Google Strawmen for the often repeated conspiracy theories of Google working with the NSA.

Assange, who was on the cypherpunks list (as I was in the late 80s/early 90s), should know better when he writes something like "The advance of information technology epitomized by Google heralds the death of privacy for most people and shifts the world toward authoritarianism. This is the principal thesis in my book, 'Cypherpunks.'"

He clearly was present for the Clipper chip fiasco which showed the state's fears over cryptography in the hands of private citizens, and the central tenet of cypherpunks was a belief that modern, unbreakable, cryptography could defang the state's ability to invade privacy. Back then, the big debate among 'punks was stuff like untraceable assassination markets using BitCoin-like distributed money in which police and the state were powerless. Anarcho-capitalists were salivating over how in the future people would be able to share and communicate with no intervention.

Point being, if you want privacy guarantees, truly want certainty, the technology exists to secure it. He was in fact, part of a movement aimed at providing the software to do it and make it easier for the average person. His experience on WikiLeaks shows how one can keep secrets from the state, even the US Government.

How one goes from the idea that cryptography presents the opportunity for undefeatable privacy, anonymity, confidentiality, etc no matter how much the state is against it, to, voluntary use of Google is the death of privacy, I don't get.

Now, I never believed that cryptography alone could overcome the state, but a lot of cypherpunks did. But there was a huge intersection between cypherpunks and libertarians, who would take the view that people have the right to trade their personal information and that there is nothing evil or bad about organizations offering to make that trade.

I also think people are too fixated on Google, when VISA/Mastercard, your Bank, your phone carrier, and your ISP have much longer, more comprehensive, and detailed records on your behavior that the police can, and have, been monitoring far longer and with less oversight. Remember Carnivore? Do you trust Comcast? I trust Google more to fight for privacy of my data against the government, than any of those organizations. After 9/11 AT&T practically rolled over for the US government. When a crime happens, the police can subpoena your email, but the reality is, they obtain your phone and financial records first. Google's stock price would go to $0 if there was a serious breach of trust, the company is built on that. AT&T or Comcast are not built on love of their products.

Google's "Don't Be Evil" motto is not about perfection, it is a value, a gradient, that you strive for. As Assange alludes to, Google culture is made of a mixture Silicon Valley graduate student culture, the hacker ethos, etc. The company chock full of 10,000+ people who believe or have internalized these values to some extent, whether you believe they are deluded cultists, or naive, that's how folks feel. There's simply no way Googlers would tolerate something like secretly sending user data to the NSA, it would be too hard to prevent internal employees from revolting. As an employee, I'd rather Google lose money and stock price and have the government shut them down, than send a firehose feed to the NSA.