You, of course, never use Google or any of the other search engines to explore the darker sides of the web or to seek information to help with your personal problems. Oh, wait, you do?! Then, you should read this eye-opening New York Times article today about AOL's inadvertent leakage onto the web of 20 million web searches by 675,000 people over the course of three months.

An intrepid Times reporter explored all the searches by AOL Searcher No. 4417749 -- and lo and behold, was able to discern by sifting the tea leaves of the searches that they were conducted by one Thelma Arnold, a 62-year-old woman in Liburn, Ga. Ms. Arnold, needless to say, was pretty surprised and disturbed to be called by the reporter. What's it all mean? It means, according to the executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center, there's "a ticking privacy time bomb" in all our searches out there on the web. Read the story here (you'll have to register to read it -- it's free).