Google found itself having to apologise to a Kenya based start-up, Mocality, after the company had its databases compromised by a Kenya team working for the internet search giant.

 

This prompted Google’s vice president for product and engineering for Europe and emerging markets, Nelson Mattos to issue a public apology to the company on his Google+ account.

 

“We were mortified to learn that a team of people working on a Google project improperly used Mocality’s data and misrepresented our relationship with Mocality to encourage customers to create new websites. We’ve already unreservedly apologised to Mocality. We’re still investigating exactly how this happened, and as soon as we have all the facts, we’ll be taking the appropriate action with the people involved,” wrote Mattos.

 

According to Mashable, the contractors in question were accessing the call lists of mobile directory business directory company and poaching customers. Apparently, more than 30% of Mocality’s customer list was contacted.

 

Prior to the apology, Mocality chief executive officer Stefan Magdalinski had some harsh words for Google.

 

“Google isn’t just scalping us, they’re also scalping every Kenyan who has participated in our program,” Magdalinski is quoted as saying."Google has been telling untruths about their relationship with us, and about our business practices, in order to do so,” he added.

 

Mashable reports that Google’s contractors were claiming that Mocality was in a partnership with Google, and contacting the customers gleaned from Mocality’s contact list to sell them products associated with Google’s competing Getting Kenyan Businesses Online initiative.

 

Mocality became wise to the theft after they noticed that their contact lists were being accessed from one IP address.

 

The big as yet unanswered question posed on Google’s Google+ page though, is how they intend to compensate Mocality for undermining its business.