Yahoo to purge user data after 90 days

Ask.com, owned by IAC/InterActiveCorp., a year ago began offering customers the ability to "opt out" of having their information stored for more than a few hours with a product called AskEraser. Yahoo does not plan to offer such an option, Toth said.

Stronger privacy protections have not prompted many consumers to switch search engines. But privacy watchdog Jeffrey Chester said Yahoo's new policy was a gambit as it battled Google and struggled to regain its footing after bungling takeover talks with Microsoft and being unable to seal an advertising partnership with Google.

"A better approach to consumer privacy is one of the few possible competitive advantages Yahoo can embrace as it tries to survive as an independent company," Chester said. "Like Microsoft, Yahoo wants privacy to set them off from Google."

Google declined to comment. It released a statement saying it was committed to striking the "appropriate balance protecting our users' privacy and offering them benefits of data retention."

Yahoo will begin implementing its new policy next month and gradually include all of the company's services by mid-2010.

--

jessica.guynn@latimes.com