Sony's PS3 to Be Secretly Monitored by Google

The Mountain View Company Google filed a patent that reveals the search giant's intentions to monitor the gamers' activity and use it for the advertising platforms. SPOnG reported that Google wants to do this without the approval of the users because the search giant might intend to sell the gathered information to numerous advertising companies. According to the same source, the Mountain View firm is attracted by several famous names such as Second Life and World of Warcraft, as well as to the most popular consoles: PlayStation 3, Nintendo Wii and Xbox 360. Sony's PlayStation 3 was recently released and attracted an impressive number of gamers although its price is not quite low.

According to SPOnG, the patent filing sustains that the "user dialogue (eg from role playing games, simulation games etc) may be used to characterize the user (eg literate, profane, blunt or polite, quiet etc). Also, user play may be used to characterize the user (eg cautious, risk-taker, aggressive, non-confrontational, stealthy, honest, cooperative, uncooperative, etc). Such saved information may be thought of state information, and offers a valuable source of information to the advertisers."

Now, this is not something new because the search giant recently acquired AdScape, an in-game advertising company that might be used by Google to expand its advertising platforms. For example, the Mountain View firm can use the newly bought name to implement its adverts into several games and adapt them to the game's content. The shocking element of the story is represented by the fact sustaining that Google wants to do this in secret. Although it might be extremely difficult to do this without the user's notification, I'm not quite sure if it is a 100 percent legal action because it might collect private information about the gamer. For example, a certain user may not agree to send his details to Google and may consider the function a privacy violation.