California senate approves anti-Gmail bill

The California state senate on Thursday approved a bill that takes aim at Google's new Gmail service, placing strict limits on e-mail providers seeking to scan customer messages for advertising and other purposes.

The bill passed after revisions that removed a key provision that would have required e-mail providers to win the consent of anyone sending messages to their service before scanning messages.

"Google has worked in good faith with Senator Figueroa and her staff to address her concerns about privacy and online communications," the company wrote. "We believe we have reached conceptual agreement on most of the key points, but we have not yet reached agreement on all the details. As is the norm in the legislative process, work still remains on the specific language of the bill."

The Senate action comes as Google is seeking to fend off an unexpected backlash against Gmail, a Web-based e-mail service that turned heads when it was unveiled in late March with an offer of 1GB of free storage.

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