L.A. Times reports that Google is facing court action in Switzerland because it isn’t meeting the country’s demands for tighter privacy protection with its Google Maps’ Street View service, according to a Swiss government official.
Street View is a feature that lets users pick a point on a map and see a panoramic street-level image of the surroundings. By adjusting the location of the point, a user can take a virtual walk down the street. Google constructs the images from panoramic photos taken by cars it has equipped with cameras…and that travel with internet speed, apparently.
Faces had not been sufficiently blurred, and people were concerned about being shown near “sensitive locations, for example outside hospitals, prisons or schools,” Swiss government official Hanspeter Thuer said.
Google argues that it provides measures to protect privacy by making it possible for people to contact Google and ask to have pictures of their property removed from Street View. The company also said it spoke with privacy regulators and gave them an opportunity to raise questions.
“We’re proud of the blurring technology we’ve developed for Street View, and are confident the product is completely legal, but we wanted to go the extra mile to address Herr Thuer’s concerns,” the company said in a blog post.
Google ran into a similar problem in the U.S. this year when a Pennsylvania couple took the company to court, saying the feature was an invasion of privacy. A judge threw out the case, saying “complete privacy does not exist” and arguing that photos and building plans of people’s home were already available to the public.
In the blog post, Google indicated it planned to fight the Swiss case as well: “We will vigorously defend Street View in court and we’re committed to continue bringing the benefits to Swiss users.”
Tags: Internet Speed