Village mob thwarts Google Street View car

[tomm2thumbs]

Source: The Times

Angry villagers formed a human chain to thwart the progress of a Google Street View car that was in the process of taking photographs of their homes.

Police were called to Broughton in Buckinghamshire yesterday, after furious villagers blocked one of the cars, complaining it was an invasion of their privacy and that the photographs would attract burglaries.

(snip)

“My immediate reaction was anger; how dare anyone take a photograph of my home without my consent? I ran outside to flag the car down and told the driver he was not only invading our privacy but also facilitating crime This is an affluent area. We’ve already had three burglaries locally in the past six weeks. If our houses are plastered all over Google it’s an invitation for more criminals to strike. I was determined to make a stand, so I called the police.”

A spokeswoman for Thames Valley Police confirmed, “A squad car was sent to Broughton at 10.20am on Wednesday to reports of a dispute between a crowd of people and a Google Street View contractor. A member of the public had called us to report that he, along with a number of others, were standing in the middle of the road preventing the car from moving forwards and taking photographs. They felt his presence was an intrusion of their privacy. When police arrived at the scene, the car had moved on.”

Read more: http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/article6022902.ece

---

I wonder if the google car captured the crowd anyway - for it's street view

[Bill McBlueState]

1. If the protesters' goal was to keep their neighborhood from getting too much attention

then FAIL.

[OKNancy]

2. that damn car came by our home in the aftermath

of a history making ice storm here in Oklahoma. Tons of tree branches were set on the curb and of course it was gloomy outside.
It looks like a disaster area.......which it was actually.

[tomm2thumbs]

3. I wanted to put a big 'censored' sign on my place - but it was too late

they had already mapped it - durn

[imdjh]

4. I don't care for it either, but it's legal.

I felt rather invaded when an old friend of mine called, and in the course of conversation mentioned having had a look at my house on Google. I assumed he meant on satellite and didn't think much of it. Wondering what it was he had seen, I googled m address and then saw the street view. The picture had apparently been taken in January of last year. Naturally, I then started googling the addresses of everyone I know that I hadn't seen in a long time.

Is there a point to this technology?

[RaleighNCDUer]

20. The ideal is to not have Big Brother watching you,

but to have EVERYONE watching you.

[Tesha]

25. Is there a point? Sure! It drives "clicks" to Google (including yours!) (NT)

[Hassin Bin Sober]

5. It is kinda creepy..

I can see in to my third floor condo window and see my woodwork and skylight.... and my truck parked on the street - empty Starbucks cup and all.

That said, the "affluent" protesters can go fuck themselves.

[Sequoia]

10. I found my house by accident.

I was rather upset. Saw the old car and then the flag up on the mailbox so I knew it had been taken in the morning sometime in the summer by the blooms on a bush.

[moggie]

11. It would be ok if only affluent people could use it

The problems all stem from common riff-raff having Internet access. They're all up to no good and can't be trusted, unlike, say, rich bankers.

[SharonAnn]

19. Our house view shows a porta-potty, a dumpster, and sawhorses.

It was obviously taken while major remodeling was going on in the fall/winter of 2007-2008.

Kind of funny, but not too attractive in case we ever want to sell the house and somebody looks the address up on Google.

[moggie]

6. Did they have torches and pitchforks?

I had to check the date on that story: it's from today (2 April), not yesterday.

Do these people understand that Google street view isn't real-time? It's not like a burglar is going to think "hey, here's a house in Broughton with an open window, I'll head down there and break in".

[mainer]

7. I kinda like those street-view shots.

My son was trying to describe the neighborhood where he just moved into a new apartment. It was cool to go onto Google and see exactly which building he lives in, and what the neighborhood looks like. We use it all the time to see where distant friends live. (And great if you want to check out the neighborhood in another town before you book a hotel.)

[tomm2thumbs]

8. soon they'll have to change the name to 'Mob View' from 'Street View' with all the riots

but they can charge to look, and make a killing

[Bonobo]

9. Sorry, but buying a house doesn't include the right to stop photos from being taken.

The Brits don't seem to mind the gov't crawling up their asses with cameras everywhere, so wtf?

[Richard D]

12. Street view does . . .

. . . facilitate crime. It's an easy way for criminals to do preliminary casing of a neighborhood, determining lighting, brush cover, homes with easy access, etc. from the comfort of their own homes.

[Djinn]

34. not really

professional burglars hit houses with stuff worth stealing and fencing in them (that pretty much counts me out - wouldn't get $100 tops from a fence for my crap) and they know better to trust street view which as well as being old, doesn't show dogs, how often the nosy biddy next door sticks her head over the fence, whether there are alarm system etc

random junkies don't case anything out, they hit what's nearest and quickest to get anything their dealer will exchange for a tiny bit of smack, they're certainly not casing on google

[NYC_SKP]

13. Hmm. Do they also protest the Police operated surveillance cameras?

Seems to me that these are the real threats.

Maybe it's just easier to harass these ordinary people than the government.

[LanternWaste]

14. Big Brother is a commercial operation...

Big Brother is not the government-- they're just a bunch of underpaid amateurs whose best use for it so far has been limited to the red-light cameras. No... Big Brother is a commercial for-profit operation with the full consent and tolerance of the people everywhere that even the trendy anarcho-individualists are part and parcel of.


Not really... but since everyone else gets the juicy, dramatic fun of overusing the term on red-light camera threads, I thought I'd try it on for size too-- just to see how it fits.

Yup-- just as absurd sounding :P

[hunter]

15. I've already been street viewed and it's quite boring random suburbia.

Hey look, it's my old truck, and the ubiquitous curbside basketball hoop!

Next time I think it would be fun to put out a naked mannequin for the google street view car, maybe have her pole dancing on the basketball hoop...

[tomm2thumbs]

16. looks like drudge is about to run with this story - but he has no link yet - strange

It's not some 'wow' story so not sure why they are waiting

[cobalt1999]

17. They probably heard the cameras "steal their souls"

Isn't that what the villagers in the old movies were always worried about?

[Tracer]

18. I like Street View! It's a great time-waster.

I've "driven" up streets that I used to live on, places I've vacationed at, where I went to school etc.

It brings back memories (without spending gas money).

[annabanana]

21. I guess people aren't allowed to walk down the block, either..

It's a public street, or it's not.

[Posteritatis]

27. What, you mean you aren't issued mandatory blindfolds?

Seems to be what these yokels want.

[dave_p]

22. Tropic of Broughton

"If our houses are plastered all over Google it’s an invitation for more criminals to strike." Quite so. It's not like these burglars could sees them from the street. I guess we should be relieved to see the stout citizenry of Bucks getting steamed up about something other than immigrants, unmarried mothers and the mounting army of "dole scroungers". But I don't think they've gotten the hang of this public/private thing. It's a house, dude. People can see it. House tend to be like that. :rofl:

But it's a start. Now if they can just get themselves down to the G-20 to protest about their ongoing robbery by their useless bank executives...

[Djinn]

35. but but

I thought the cloaking device came with the mortgage

It's a house, dude. People can see it. House tend to be like that

:rofl:

[happyslug]

23. This group would go nuts with the Allegheny County Real Estate Web site

http://www2.county.allegheny.pa.us/RealEstate/Search.aspx

Go to the web Site and type in an address. If you do NOT know the exact street number, just give the street address and a list of street number AND who owns the property will appear. Then roll down to the address you ant click it. Then click on images, and you will get a beautiful picture of whatever building or house is on that spot.

For example I typed in 5th for Name of Street, 4200 for Street number and "Pittsburgh - All Wards" for municipality, I get the following data page:
http://www2.county.allegheny.pa.us/RealEstate/GeneralInfo.aspx?ParcelID=0027S00125000000%20%20%20%20&SearchType=2&SearchStreet=5th&SearchNum=4200&SearchMuni=1

If I click on Images I get the following Image:
http://www2.county.allegheny.pa.us/RealEstate/Images.aspx?ParcelID=0027S00125000000%20%20%20%20&SearchType=2&CurrRow=0&SearchName=&SearchStreet=5th&SearchNum=4200&SearchMuni=1&SearchParcel=

ALL Buildings located in Allegheny County are listed, now the county did remove the name of Federal Judges from the Data base as a cutesy to the Federal Courts, but has resistant pulling any other names from the data base for these are all public records and used to make sure the real estate assessments are fair and equitable.

[Common Sense Party]

24. The irony is that now scores of reporters will now flock to the village

and post dozens of photos of the village homes all over the internet.

[hedgehog]

26. The protesters do have a point - as near as I can make out, British

thieves are smarter than American thieves in that instead of robbing the poor people who live in bad neighborhoods, they hop a bus across town and rob the rich people in better neighborhoods!

[AngryAmish]

28. This reminds me of when "Top Gear" was in Alabama

[Arrowhead2k1]

29. I'm the opposite. I keep looking for my house in Canada to get its picture taken.

It's coming, I just know it. :)

[high density]

30. "How dare anyone take a photograph of my home without my consent?"

??????????

In the USA we have websites made by property tax assessors that show every building in a town.

I'd think Live Maps' birds' eye view would be better for thieves than Google street view.

[AnOhioan]

31. Seriously...these folks have nothing better to do?

Much ado about nothing

[Haole Girl]

32. Probably not

Sadly.

[Djinn]

33. I'm about as paranoid as they come

but I really don't care that my house and car are easily viewable on street view - so what? unless someone knows I actually live there (in which case they already know my address) then big deal - they see a house (or teeny flat in my case) and a car. Hardly earth shattering espionage.

The people I worry about knowing about me already do and definitely don't need to go to google. I'm FAR more concerned with the US government having a long detailed history of my life and employment not to mention getting my iris scan and fingerprints on each entry.

I'm far more concerned with what the Australian coppers and various "security" numpties have stored about me.

Honestly can't for the life of me work out why anyone cares if random searchers who don't know anything about them see a random house.