Now Australian police investigating Google

'Oy Stan, 59b is sending love noted to his mistress over his unsecured network again...'
'Oy Stan, 59b is sending love noted to his mistress over his unsecured network again...'

Although they have insisted that it is a mistake, Google's gathering of WiFi information from compiling their Street View data is still hurting them, with the Australian police believed to be investigating the internet giant.

The German authorities originally turned up the fact that Google had gathered information from unsecured WiFi in it task to map the word with its Street View cars.

Google has already admitted that it gathered the information, but stated that it was down to the inadvertent inclusion of some code that was not meant to be present.

Breaches

Australian communications minister Stephen Conroy has accused Google of being responsible for the "single greatest breach in the history of privacy".

Australia's federal attorney general Robert McClelland added: "In light of concerns having been raised by the public, my department thought there were issues of substance that were raised that require police investigation."

In truth the fragments of data collected are unlikely to upset the balance of world power, but the gathering of data of which people had given no permission to access by Google is obviously concerning.

The company's mantra of 'don't be evil' has come under increasing vigilance as Google's database grows, and making mistakes like this will not help its cause.

Via Guardian

Patrick Goss

Patrick Goss is the ex-Editor in Chief of TechRadar. Patrick was a passionate and experienced journalist, and he has been lucky enough to work on some of the finest online properties on the planet, building audiences everywhere and establishing himself at the forefront of digital content.  After a long stint as the boss at TechRadar, Patrick has now moved on to a role with Apple, where he is the Managing Editor for the App Store in the UK.

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