G not prosecuted in Germany. Google Privacy Inquiries Get Little Cooperation. Gero Breloer/DPA A Google Street View car taking photographs in Berlin.
German regulators sought information on data Google collected. After months of negotiation, Johannes Caspar, a German data protection official, forced to show him exactly what its Street View cars had been collecting from potentially millions of his fellow citizens. Snippets of e-mails, photographs, passwords, chat messages, postings on Web sites and social networks — all sorts of private Internet communications — were casually scooped up as the specially equipped cars photographed the world’s streets. “It was one of the biggest violations of data protection laws that we had ever seen,” Mr. Google might be one of the coolest and smartest companies of this or any era, but it also upsets a lot of people — competitors who argue it wields its tremendous weight unfairly, officials like Mr. But never count Google out. People willingly, at times eagerly, surrender this information. Berlin court rules Google Street View is legal in Germany. A Berlin court has ruled that Google Street View is, in fact, legal in Germany.
Last Tuesday, the Berlin State Supreme Court (Kammergericht) announced its decision in a court case from late last year, in which a woman had sued Google, fearing that photos of her, her family and the front of her house would be posted on Google Street View and would thus violate her property and privacy rights. The court ruled that it is legal to take photographs from street level, rejecting her argument that Google was trying to take unauthorized pictures. Part of her argument rested on the fact that Google used cameras mounted at three meters (9.84 feet) high, which could see over her two-meter-high hedge. German Street View error lets iPhone users see hidden images. November 05, 2010, 8:00 AM — Google is facing fresh complaints over Street View in Germany, after technical problems caused some properties to be visible rather than blurred in a preview of the service launched earlier this week.
Users of Apple iPads and iPhones found that the blurring was not complete on their devices, said Johannes Caspar, head of the Data Protection Agency (DPA) for Hamburg, on Friday. Google released imagery for the city of Oberstaufen and landmarks in five other German cities on Tuesday. Google "agreed with our objections that nobody should see these pictures," Caspar said. Setting Hurdles for Google and Others: 'Germans Like to Look, But Not to Be Looked At' - SPIEGEL ONLINE - News - International. High-level German politicians seem to love holding summit meetings -- the more pressing the issue, the greater the priority it will get.
This week, the issue is Google and the Street View service it plans to launch in the country before the end of the year. By now, it is no secret that Street View has been a lightning rod for criticism in Germany. The country's interior minister, Thomas de Maizière, said Tuesday he would convene a summit meeting, titled the "Digitalization of Town and Country," on Sept. 20. He wants to invite all participants to the negotiating table: government ministers, consumer, data and privacy protection officials as well as the companies in question -- including, above all, Google.
In an interview published in the Süddeutsche Zeitung newspaper on Tuesday, Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger called on de Maizière to quickly reform the country's data protection law. An Uproar Across the Country Fears of Unintended Collateral Damage But de Maizière disagrees. Germany: liability for an unsecured private WiFi network. An interesting case has been decided by the German BGH on 12 May 2010.
A private individual left his home WiFi router unsecured (on factory default settings). Someone downloaded a copyright protected piece of music using the unsecured WiFi spot. The owner could show that he was, at the time of the download, on vacation and could therefore not have been the one downloading. The owner of the copyright in the song sued for copyright infringement, asking for an injunction and financial damages. The first instance court both issued an injunction and found the owner of the WiFi spot liable to pay damages. Germany gets new privacy tool from Google. Germany opposes Google Street View switch-on. 20 September 2010Last updated at 18:34 Germany is the largest country in Europe without Street View The German government has called for voluntary data protection code to be in place by 7 December 2010.
The move follows a meeting with Google, Apple and other companies to discuss how personal data is accessible on line. It comes as the German newspaper Der Spiegel reports that "several hundred thousand" people have opted out of Google's Street View service. Google has yet to launch its service in Germany, following privacy complaints. The German Interior Minister, Thomas de Maiziere, said that the proposal to establish a code by 7 December "met with approval" and that it will enable users to obtain information on the gathering and intended user of data "in a user-friendly way". Opt-out concerns. Google Street View Under Fire for Privacy in Germany. Google is under fire again over privacy issues in Germany after initial concerns over WiFi sniffing regarding the Google Street View team.
This time, German officials are concerned that Google is only giving building owners only 4 weeks of time to opt out and have their buildings not show up on Google Street View. Google says that it will implement Street View in twenty of the largest German cities, including Munich and Berlin, and property owners will have four weeks to register to ensure their buildings do not show up online. Google To Provide WiSpy Data To Germany And France.