Google continues to buy as it builds, snapping up social-network technology company Angstro for an undisclosed sum.
The Los Angeles Times noted that company founder Rohit Khare posted a message on the Angstro home page Thursday telling customers and readers that he would be joining Google. Google confirmed the buy to the Times, and Google's Joseph Smarr welcomed Khare to the company in a post to Twitter, but didn't provide any additional information.
Angstro develops technology that helps Internet users get accurate news information about friends or business contacts by making sure those stories are actually about their friends, as opposed to unknown people with similar names. It takes social information from one's profile at a service such as LinkedIn to analyze contacts and separate out false returns for people outside of your web of social connections.
It's not hard to imagine Google using that type of verification technology in whatever features it bakes into Google Me, the much-discussed-yet-unconfirmed social service Google is believed to be building. Angstro joins Google just weeks after it finalized the acquisition of Slide as well as the purchase of Jambool, a developer of virtual currency for social games.