A new sharing feature in Google Reader that Google added a couple of weeks ago seems to be the object of a small privacy debate.

On December 14, Google’s RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feed reader application, Google Reader, introduced a new feature that lets you share posts with anyone in your Gmail or Gtalk contact list. The problem is that you don’t want to share some of these posts with your boss or maybe with your mother, or anyone in your list that you hardly speak to. And as if this is not enough, Google Reader provides no way to opt out of the feature short or deleting every item you’ve ever shared.

Therefore, many bloggers expressed their concerns about Google’s move, with some of them complaining that Google is invading their privacy by sharing items with people who they did not want to share with and some others blaming users for not understanding what “shared” means.

"I don't want my ex-husband reading my feeds. But, I need to keep his email address in my contacts because we still need to communicate regarding the details of our divorce," a user identified as Spunky posted on the forums, the PC Magazine reported.

On December 26, Google responded on the company blog dedicated to Reader.

"We'd hoped that making it easier to share with the people you chat with often would be useful and interesting, but we underestimated the number of users who were using the Share button to send stories to a limited number of people," said the blog.

 "We're looking at ways to make sharing more granular and flexible. Please keep your feedback coming," Chrix Finne, a product manager and Google spokesperson who blogs about Reader, said. Then Finne spelled out ways users could share feeds with only some of the Google Talk/GMail contacts.

This debate over Google Reader comes second after Facebook’s privacy problem. In November, Facebook launched an advertising system, named Beacon, which notified friends in your network when you buy items on sites of Facebook partners. Facebook was forced to modify this feature after consumer groups and Facebook members complained the service violated people’s privacy.