Yahoo! is cutting to three months the amount of time it retains personal data gleaned from internet surfers.

The Californian search group had kept details of queries linked to individual internet addresses for up to 13 months and the reduction to 90 days means that its retention period is the shortest among its rivals.

Google, the market leader, stores data for nine months, having halved the period in September. Microsoft, the owner of MSN Search, has said that it will drop its 18-month span to six months only if rivals matched it.

Anne Toth, Yahoo!’s vice-president of policy and head of privacy, said that the policy “sets a new benchmark for the industry” and added: “Our users expect relevant content and advertising but they also want assurances that we are protecting their privacy.”

All three companies keep records of every search made on their engine and link that information to an internet address. Every internet connection has its own address, meaning that it is possible to link specific searches to specific individuals when they go online at home.

Search engines had come under pressure from the European Union, which had questioned the necessity of retaining data for so long. The EU has recommended that data be kept for no more than six months and urged the sector to adopt an industry-wide standard.

Ari Schwartz, vice-president of the Centre for Democracy and Technology, a privacy advocacy group, said that the Yahoo! pledge was more significant than Google’s moves because it had an implementation plan to delete data after 90 days.

Data had been kept to help to introduce targeted advertising linking specific web searches with the sites of relevant retailers or interest groups — and for internal analysis purposes in vast internal repositories.

Google, for example, says that it uses the data it retains to help to develop features such as its spell checker. When it sees what it thinks is a misspelt search term, it responds with the message “did you mean” and the suggested alternative.

Google said that it had no immediate plans to cut its nine-month limit further in light of Yahoo!’s move.

Peter Fleischer, Google’s global privacy counsel, said: “When we make changes to our policies, they are dependent on what will be best for our users both in terms of the services we provide and respect of their privacy.”

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