Google CEO Eric Schmidt said in a CNBC interview (Dec 2009) said, “If you have something that you don’t want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn’t be doing it in the first place.” Eric added, “But if you really need that kind of privacy, the reality is that search engines – including Google – do retain this information for some time. And it’s important, for example, that we’re all subject in the United States to the Patriot Act… it is possible that that information could be made available to the authorities.”

In another interview in August 2010, Mr Schmidt said that he believed that every young person will one day be allowed to change their name to distance themselves from embarrassing photographs and material stored on their friends’ social media sites. Apparently, he meant that as a joke. Watch him explain this on Colbert Report.