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Spell Checking Online VS Privacy



The free application for checking English spelling and grammar Grammarly, created by two immigrants from Ukraine Aleksey Shevchenko and Maxim Litvin, allows you to find mistakes that MS Word and other text editors can miss. The same Word will ignore usage errors, because everything that interests him is the correct coordination, so if you write, for example, The boy ran really fast to catch the runaway ball, Word will not notice anything, and Grammarly will offer to replace it with The boy sprinted to catch the runaway ball.

The application’s functionality allows you to embed it in most popular browsers (Chrome, Firefox and Safari are currently supported), after which Grammarly will catch errors when writing English text right in the process. However, we’re more interested not in functionality, but in Grammarly’s privacy and security, and for starters, as usual, we’ll get acquainted with the application’s privacy policy, and then give the opinions of experienced users and experts.

What guarantees Grammarly


The Grammarly privacy policy (the latest edition at the time of writing is dated December 30, 2019) says the following: “We do not sell and we will not sell your information. We do not help other companies advertise their products to you. ” That is, at first glance, the company ensures the security of user data and does not transfer information about its users to third parties, but then there is the following clause: “We use a small number of trusted third-party companies to provide our products.” This means that transferring your data is still possible.

We look under the following conditions: “We work with service providers to provide specific services and functions, including email communications, customer support services and analytics. These service providers may only access, process or store personal data in accordance with our instructions. ” And further: "We have your explicit consent to the provision of your personal data." However, “Grammarly does not share your personal information with third parties in order to enable them to show you their ads.”

That is, Grammarly does not cooperate with advertising and marketing companies (Google, Facebook and smaller suppliers of targeted advertising), which can be considered a bold plus, however, security of personal data still does not guarantee, because “access to your personal data can be protected ... the security of Grammarly and users of our site, software and / or services, or in response to law enforcement requests. ”

Confidential or not?


Grammarly's privacy questions are asked regularly, as many Western users are worried. Here is what Quora users who have been with Grammarly for several years write about the privacy of this application:

“Grammarly does not raise questions from the point of view of the security of your system: it is a proven browser extension and a renowned service provider. But in terms of confidentiality, it is terrible: everything you enter, including even what you delete, is sent to their servers, and this is not anonymous. Also, you cannot know if your information has been passed on to third parties ... So if you are worried about your privacy, I would not recommend Grammarly. However, if you use Gmail, Google Docs or any other similar web / cloud tool, the situation is the same. So if you plan to use Grammarly together with Google Docs or Gmail, it will not compromise your privacy, because you already share your materials with Google and only add a new owner for your content. "

“Obviously, this is a reputable company, so you can expect that they basically just analyze the text to improve their algorithms. In the worst case, they will provide information to law enforcement officials - upon request, for example. Regarding how much they protect their servers, they write the following: “Grammarly commits itself to protecting the security of your information and takes reasonable precautions to protect it. However, data transmission over the Internet cannot be 100% protected, and as a result, we cannot ensure the security of the information that you transmit to us, including personal data and user content; accordingly, you acknowledge that you do this at your own peril and risk. ” Therefore, I would disable the software when entering sensitive data. ”

Expert opinion


And the feedback from experienced users who care about their online safety is fully supported by the opinions of security experts who analyzed Grammarly for privacy. So, RJ Associates analyst Richi Jennings two years ago published a crushing Grammarly privacy article titled Grammarly leaks everything you've ever typed in the service. Everything: “Everything you type in Grammarly leaks into the network. All."

In the article, he drew attention to the serious browser extension vulnerability discovered by English hacker Tavis Ormandy: “Any web page can easily hack your session and steal all the information from your Grammarly account, that is, absolutely everything that you entered with using the service. " And then he recalls that most of the extensions in browsers can collect such sensitive data. True, representatives of Grammarly reacted quite quickly to the publication and said that the error in the security system of the extension was fixed, but there were still questions about confidentiality.

In a more recent article, the editor-in-chief of lifehacker.com, David Murphy, writes: “The extension works by analyzing what you print. It collects this data, processes it, and (presumably) deletes it upon completion of work. Although it looks innocent on paper and Grammarly swears by its methods of ensuring confidentiality, it all boils down to the question of trust that you put in a company that you essentially know nothing about. ” Murphy himself, by the way, deleted Grammarly from his browser, deciding that the built-in spell check from Google Chrome was enough for him.

Think for yourself, decide for yourself


So, Grammarly does not cooperate with advertising networks, and you will not see targeted advertising - this is a definite plus. On the other hand, no one is safe from transferring your information to other interested parties, and the application itself reads and saves everything you print, and, according to some experts, even what you printed and deleted. We add here periodically occurring vulnerabilities that open access to your information on any site.

Thus, the Grammarly application is only relatively safe and completely non-confidential. However, some users, having installed the extension, then forget that on individual sites (for example, where bank card data is entered) it must be turned off. As a result, there is a risk of leakage of your personal data, because no one guarantees that a new vulnerability will not appear, and the question of trust in developers remains open. What do you choose: good English or privacy?

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