PRIVACY: Evernote’s privacy policy allows its employees to read your notes, and you can’t opt out.

Evernote’s CEO, Chris O’Neill, has responded to yesterday’s reports about the company’s privacy policy. His response both affirms and clarifies what was stated in our post above.

We recently announced an update to Evernote’s privacy policy that we communicated poorly, and it resulted in some understandable confusion. We’ve heard your concerns, and we apologize for any angst we may have caused. In response to the questions you’ve raised, let me be clear about what’s not changing and what is changing.

O’Neill goes on to explain that Evernote employees do not view the content of user notes except in very limited cases, such as where required by the law, troubleshooting, etc. The number of employees who are authorized to view this content is extremely limited by Evernote’s existing policies, and the CEO is personally involved in defining them. From this, users will not have the option of opting out of, and it’s been this way well prior to the recent privacy policy update.

What is changing, as O’Neill notes, is what we explained in our original post. Customers that opt in to machine learning may have their data viewed by Evernote employees to ensure that the features are working properly. However, O’Neill does clarify how this data will be accessed, and whether or not it is personally identifiable:

If you choose to participate in these experimental features, you’ll enjoy a more personalized experience. Select Evernote employees may see random content to ensure the features are working properly but they won’t know who it belongs to. They’ll only see the snippet they’re checking. Not only that, but if a machine identifies any personal information, it will mask it from the employee.

These are key details that were not properly explained in the initial update to the privacy policy, and it resulted in the outrage that we saw yesterday.

There would seem to be both plusses and minuses to Evernote’s terms of service, and it’s best that you know — stripped of the hype — exactly what you’re agreeing to.