The Washington Post is running an interesting piece on Google's efforts to increase its precence in Washington.  Nearly 200 federal contractors, employees, and military personnel are attending a two-day sales meeting in the U.S. capitol hosted by Google… and complete with scrambled eggs (maybe they're all just there for breakfast).  The subject of the meeting?  Quite simple:

 

What can Google do for the federal government?

 

According to The Post, federal spending already accounts for over $300,000 of Google's earnings a year.  In particular, the article talks about the U.S. military's use of Google Earth to assist forces on the ground in Iraq.  But, in typical Washington style, no one was talking specifics.

 

Google wants to increase federal use of it's mapping products, as well as roll out search technology and Google Apps for more federal users.  Civilian, military, and intelligence agencies are all being targeted by Google as potential customers.  As one analyst put it, most federal agencies "have trouble" with information and Google is no doubt promising to help with those troubles.

 

Versions of these Google services would almost have to be modified for use by government agencies.  Right?  Although I can certainly see how Google Earth could be a huge help to the military, does the federal government really want its employees typing up memos and documents for storage on Google's servers?  Do we, as citizens, really want federal documents sitting on Google servers?

 

Before you jump the gun, I'm not playing the "oooo… scary Google" game here.  My concern is not Google-specific.  Between lost laptops and CIA leaks, the government already has enough problems with sensitive information escaping it's control.  The last thing they need are more places where data could get lost, compromised, or otherwise messed with.

 

Do they really want Google getting its indexy hands on that information?