Following the recent events related to a security breach on Google +, Google has announced that they are initiating the shut down of the platform. Namely, Google + had a major security flaw that recently caused a chaos among its users. To be specific, the mistake in their system exposed user information, which affected over 500 000 Google + users.
This security issue surfaced in March 2018, following a series of unexpected actions made by the large corporation. Namely, Google was aware of the security flaw in their system. However, assuming that no one actually gained access to people’s information, they decided to keep quiet when it comes to this problem. This decision may have backfired on them, as they are currently facing the consequences.
Not informing the users of a potential security threat is against all online privacy laws. Judging by their actions, Google didn’t have much choice left but to completely shut down the service. However, shutting down Google + is going to take a while, since it is a massive, global service used in almost every country in the world. Google has officially announced that they are going to shut down the consumer version of the Google + platform, partially because of the security issue and partially because of low engagement.
Even if the security issue never surfaced, Google + would probably come to an end because of low usage, as the company’s statistics show that over 90% of all Google + sessions last less than five seconds in total. However, they are going to keep the service running for enterprise customers, that is, those who are planning to use Google + as a means of communication among co-workers and business teams.
Even despite the recent security issues, Google has announced that they are keeping this part of the service alive and they will even release several updates and new features for enterprise users. Moreover, the process of shutting down Google + is going to take around 10 months but once it is done, the platform will be completely shut down and unavailable for regular consumers.
