Privacy

The release of Google Street View unleashed a lot of controversy. Although it served as a useful tool, it exposed certain pictures of the public that some individuals did not want on the internet. Some pictures included girls sunbathing, men walking into adult stores, people smoking, drivers speeding, and more. This clearly is an invasion of privacy and an issue that Google had to face in releasing this piece of software.

Individuals that did not want their photographs posted on the internet contacted Google about this. Google's initial response to this was a request for unnecessary information which included: a copy of driver's license, legal name, e-mail address, and street view address of the photo to be removed. After numerous complaints, Google then reduced their request to: name and location of photo.

Although Google is being fair about this, an individual's unwanted photo will still be on the web for as long as it takes for the user to find it as well as the time it takes for Google to take it down. This will serve as a problem for as long as this software exists.

I feel that to an extent, Google's public photography is fair. If people did not want photo's of themselves doing whatever they are doing IN PUBLIC, then they should elsewhere. Of course there are extreme measures that may be crossing the line, but overall, if people are afraid of being looked at then do your business in a more private setting.