Google Drops Off 'Most Trusted For Privacy' List

The Ponemon Institute and TRUSTe have completed their fifth annual survey of companies considered by consumers to be "most trustworthy and which did the best job safeguarding personal information." Over 6,500 consumers participated in the survey. And for the first time, Google's name isn't on the list:

"Google (and Microsoft) suffer from big company syndrome," Dr. Larry Ponemon said. "People figure that if you're big and collecting data, there must be an issue."

Understandably shaky financial institutions aside, most of the names on the list made gains over last year, notably Facebook, Yahoo and Apple, all of which are new to the list. AOL slipped the most, down 12 places. Also new to the scene are FedEx and Verizon, but it's Facebook that's getting kudos:

While the financial services sector slipped amid industry-wide woes, the technology sector showed marked improvement as eBay, Apple, Yahoo, Microsoft, and HP all bettered previous rankings. Also of note, Facebook moved into the top 20 for the first time, signifying an increased trust in social networking as a mainstream communications tool.

Here's the entire list:

1. American Express (remained No. 1)
2. eBay (+6)
3. IBM (no change)
4. Amazon (+1)
5. Johnson & Johnson (+ 1)
6. Hewlett Packard (+10)
7. U.S. Postal Service (+1)
8. Procter & Gamble (+2)
9. Apple (new to the top 20)
10. Nationwide (remained the same)
11. Charles Schwab (-8)
12. USAA (+4)
13. Intuit (+7)
14. WebMD (-1)
15. Yahoo (new to the top 20)
16. Facebook (new to the top 20)
17. Disney (-1)
18. AOL (-12)
19. Verizon (new to the top 20)
20. FedEx (new to the top 20)
21. US Bank (-2)
22. Dell (-7)
23. 20. eLoan (-9)

Google slips from list of top companies on privacy [CNet]