Google Agrees to Give Viacom Encrypted Data

In a deal reached last night, Google has agreed to hand over YouTube user data Viacom had demanded in its copyright lawsuit, but only after replacing user names and IP addresses with unique substitutes to protect users’ privacy, the Wall Street Journal reports. The move will allow Viacom and other plaintiffs to explore statistics without learning who’s viewing what.

The plan will let the plaintiffs compare hits for their videos to the popularity of other YouTube clips, without risking the privacy associated with showing user IDs, which may contain viewers’ names, and IP addresses, which can be used to trace viewers’ locations. (More YouTube stories.)