Smile You Are On Google’s “Street View” Candid Camera
Australia – Amid criticism against the feature by privacy activists around the world, Google has finally managed to unveil its controversial Street View mapping tool in Australia and Japan.
Today, Australia becomes the third country to have its cities, streets and landmarks “scanned into” Google as the search giant unveils its most ambitious Street View project to date.
Australians can now view private and personal pictures of Australian houses, businesses, and prominent landmarks in cities, towns and distant areas are now available on Google Maps Australia.
“Street View, the latest addition to the popular website, contains more than 10 million images that users can search and view.”
Google’s Street View is an online tool that allows users enjoy a virtual tour of landscapes from their computer by perusing an interactive database of millions of 360-degree snapshots.
The images are taken by a fleet of cars equipped with special cameras that drive across the country, capturing pictures on every street corner and along every highway.
The technology thus far has been used to create virtual replicas of major US cities and the route of this year’s Tour De France, but Google will today unveil its most comprehensive Street View project to date — the mapping of virtually all of southeast Australia and much of the east and west coasts.
The Street View service has raised privacy concerns in some quarters, but it has helped me navigate in areas I have never visited: What does the house I’m visiting look like? Or the street corner where I’m supposed to get off the bus? Or where exactly is that big-box retailer?
Google also is extending Street View to Europe, and in the process is gathering data that will let it create 3D models as well.
“To alleviate privacy concerns, Google blurs faces in Street View.”
Users can access Street View, which allows people to explore the country at ground level for the first time with little more than a computer and an internet connection.
Google-branded Holden Astra cars with roof-mounted cameras began traversing our streets about November last year, taking tens of millions of detailed panoramic street-level photos.
Most Australian coastal cities and many regional and outback towns are covered but there are some notable omissions, such as Uluru.
Users will be able to wander the streets of Australian cities and towns from Port Douglas to Perth and along the Stuart and Eyre highways that cross the country, as well as view icons such as the Australian War Memorial and the Sydney Harbour Bridge.
Google product manager Andrew Foster said that because the company’s mapping tool was based on technology developed in Australia, it was excited to bring Street View to the country.
“Google Maps has its origins as an Australian invention so we are thrilled to bring Street View here as one of the first countries in the world,” he said.
Google Maps, the online mapping service that incorporates Street View, is based on a product created in Sydney by Where 2 Technologies that was purchased by Google in 2004.
Street View was launched in the US in May last year and has since expanded to parts of France and Italy. Google’s camera-equipped cars have also been spotted in New Zealand, Britain, Germany, Spain, Ireland, the Czech Republic, Japan, Switzerland and Norway.
“Our ambition is to be a world map,” said Lars Rasmussen, Google Australia’s engineer and one of the original creators of Google Maps.
Google expects tourists, home seekers, students and armchair explorers to embrace Street View in their research. The feature has already been praised by Tourism Australia, the Real Estate Institute of Australia and the Australian Geography Teachers Association.
In response to security concerns raised in the US, Google said last year its Street View service would not identify faces or license plates in Australia.
Google Australia spokesman Rob Shilkin said the quote had been taken out of context and no Australian private roads would be visible on Street View.
To assuage local privacy concerns, Google demonstrated Street View for the Office of the Privacy Commissioner, the Australian Privacy Foundation and various welfare groups for homeless people.
The privacy commissioner, Karen Curtis, said she would continue to monitor Street View but those with concerns could first contact Google and then her office directly.
The company has recently introduced an automatic face-blurring technology designed to obscure the identities of people caught in the lens of Street View. Shilkin said that the low resolution of images would prevent vehicle number plates from being identifiable.
Users can also report any Street View images they believe to be inappropriate through a link on the website. Foster said it would take anywhere between a few minutes to “a day or so” to remove to offending images once they were reported.
Dan Svantesson, co-chairman of the privacy foundation’s internet subcommittee and a law professor at Bond University, applauded Google for developing the blurring technology but said its effectiveness would only be apparent after Street View went live today.
He said he was concerned that the link to the form for users to report privacy concerns with individual images was not visible enough. And even with the blurring technology, cars and people — particularly those in small towns or neighborhoods — could still be identified from other features.
Street View Australia would be updated in “a few months” with more images, and Street View in general was updated “from time to time”, Foster said.
The Google Street View fleet of cars — which company representatives made a point of identifying as Holden Astras — began capturing images across Australia last November.
In addition, the Google Lat-Long blog said the Japan imagery covers Tokyo, Osaka, Kyoto, Kobe, and other cities in Japan, while Australia gets Sydney, Perth, Melbourne, and others.