Microsoft to delete IP address of Bing users in 6 months

Bangalore: Microsoft has sent a letter to the Article 29 Data Protection Working Party, a collection of EU's top minds on data protection, saying that it would reduce the amount of time it stores IP addresses from searchers to six months before deleting them, reports ARS Technica.

Currently, Bing takes search data and separates the user's account information (such as e-mail or phone number) from the non-personal information (such as what the query was) and only after 18 months does it delete the IP address and any other cross session IDs associated with the query. Now, the IP address will be removed completely at six months to provide greater user privacy protection, while the rest of the process remains the same.

The change will be implemented over the next 12 to 18 months. The objective is to satisfy the European advisory group, which has been critical of how search engines collect and retain data on individuals for advertising purposes. In April 2008, the group issued a major report in which it said that search engines can only hang on to European user data for six months, must generally treat IP addresses as personal information, and must comply with the rules even if they are based outside the EU. The panel, which is comprised of national privacy regulators from each of the 27 countries, asked Google, Yahoo and Microsoft to comply with these demands. After changes made last year, Google keeps data for nine months while Yahoo keeps for three months.