Google, the popular search engine launched its popular yet controversial mapping service ‘Street View’ in Bangalore. With the help of Street View, users can view pedestrian level photos of streets and houses. Four years ago, Google launched Street View technology in the US. This feature is used through Goggle Maps and Google Earth to explore places and get a 360 degree view from various positions along various streets in the world. Today it is used in 100 cities across 27 countries and this feature is also available in mobile phones.
For collecting images of various landmarks, Google has introduced camera mounted on cars and tri wheelers to cover all narrow roads in Bangalore. This service is launched in India, at a time when the Government of India is becoming highly conscious of privacy laws. Recently, in the month of April 2011, India amended the existing Information Technology Act, and added many clauses that protect sensitive information of the citizen.
This service was criticized because of privacy concerns in US in 2007. Google then admitted that it has collected Wi-Fi payload data by mistake using the street view cars and then it stopped collecting Wi-Fi data.
With regard to the service being launched in India, Google said that it will address the privacy concerns and is continuously monitoring reports of privacy violations. Google will collect only public data and it has also developed a process by which the faces and identifiable details like number plates will be blurred out of the images. Google has obtained consent from local authorities in the country and is open to discussions.