Google Maps Street View feature has always had a question mark hanging over it in terms of invasion of privacy and civil liberties, but now those accusations have been raised a notch by a whole town in Minnesota telling Google to remove it from the application.

Back in April we heard about a couple, aptly named Aaron and Christine Boring, who were suing Google for invasion of privacy after their home in Pittsburgh was featured on Street View despite clear signs that they lived in a private road.

Now, rather than just one couple valuing their privacy we have a whole town. North Oaks in Minnesota has 4,500 residents north of St. Paul who all belong to a private community, and not merely content with keeping trespassers out of their neighbourhood for real, they don’t even want them encroaching virtually.

According to the Star Tribune, the North Oaks City Council sent a letter to Google in January asking for all images of the private roads and homes to be removed from the site. Google complied but was surprised that a whole town had made the request, as the company usually just has to deal with a few individuals who refuse to have their homes featured on the site.

North Oaks Mayor Thomas Watson said:

“It’s not the hoity-toity folks trying to figure out how to keep the world away. They really didn’t have any authorization to go on private property.”

It would be easy to mock the town but people buy homes in private roads for a reason, and to have those reasons taken away by a website openly abusing the privacy requests must be very frustrating.

Of course there is the argument that Google are only showing what anyone walking around can openly see anyway, but when it comes to private roads that argument fails to stand up. I can see this type of request becoming more common as more US cities get included on the service. And if it ever rolls out to Europe and beyond, Google may find themselves overwhelmed with trouble.

Related:

Google responds to Google Maps Street View privacy concerns in Europe

Google faces Street View ban in the UK - Does it violate privacy law?

Google Street View is not privacy-infringing - receives green light in UK

Teenagers use Google Earth, Facebook to organise illegal pool parties

Google expands Street View with 4 more cities

Entry was posted on Sunday, June 1st, 2008 at 4:35 pm under Amusing, Bizarre, Google, Internet, Legal, Opinion.  Print This Post

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