Evernote announced about changes in its privacy policies just yesterday. But due to drawbacks in its not-so-private policy changes, the company now said that the announcement has been reversed. The company will not be allowing access to notes for improvement of the company’s machine learning technologies.
As reported earlier, the update would allow employees to exercise oversight of machine learning technologies applied to user account content. The access was applicable from 23rd January subject to background checks and selected candidates would receive specific security and privacy training. But due to concerns raised by existing users, the company has now decided to make the policy opt-in rather than being non-negotiable as earlier.
CEO Chris O’Neill provided clarification to enraged users in the official blog post which states:
We announced a change to our privacy policy that made it seem like we didn’t care about the privacy of our customers or their notes. This was not our intent, and our customers let us know that we messed up, in no uncertain terms. We heard them, and we’re taking immediate action to fix it. We are excited about what we can offer Evernote customers thanks to the use of machine learning, but we must ask for permission, not assume we have it. We’re sorry we disappointed our customers, and we are reviewing our entire privacy policy because of this.
Thus, it means Evernote employees will not be able to access your notes unless your prior permission has been granted. Further with the statement out, we are assured that our privacy concerns are essential for the Evernote team. But, this decision by the company certainly makes to the list of worst decisions ever made, and then nullifying it just the next day. Wish they would have asked for some opinions and suggestions before hand instead of going for this PR nightmare.
For now, Evernote once again stands upon its 3 Laws of Data Protection- your data is yours, protected as well as portable.
