Germany’s consumer protection minister strongly criticized Google for a widespread privacy breach and insisted on Saturday that the US Internet giant must cooperate better with data protection authorities.
Google Inc issued an apology on Friday, acknowledging it has been vacuuming up fragments of people’s online activities broadcast over public Wi-Fi networks for the past four years while expanding a mapping feature called “Street View.”
German Minister Ilse Aigner said the “alarming incident” showed that Google still lacked an understanding of the need for privacy.
“According to the information available to us so far, Google has for years penetrated private networks, apparently illegally,” her office said in a statement on Saturday.
The ministry also accused Google of withholding information requested by German regulators.
Only two weeks ago, Google was telling Germany’s consumer protection authorities that it was only recording the network’s names and addresses. Repeated questions about whether the company was gathering even more data remained unanswered, the statement said.
“Maintaining people’s trust is crucial to everything we do,” Alan Eustace, Google’s top engineering executive, wrote in a blog post. “We are acutely aware that we failed badly here.”
Google has characterized its collection of snippets from e-mails and Web surfing done on public Wi-Fi networks as a mistake and said it has taken steps to avoid a recurrence. The company said it only recently discovered the problem following the inquiry from German regulators.
“Street View” provides photographs of neighborhoods taken by Google cameras. The service has been enormously controversial in Germany and other countries as privacy groups and authorities fear that people — filmed without their consent — could be seen doing things they didn’t want to be seen doing or in places where they didn’t want to be seen.
The German ministry is now demanding that Google follow through on pledges to disclose its activities to data protection authorities in all countries.
“It also has to be disclosed to German data protection agencies which information is registered and how the illegitimately gathered data of unprotected wireless networks will be deleted,” Aigner’s ministry said.
Google gathered about 600 gigabytes of data from Wi-Fi networks in more than 30 countries, including the US. Google plans to delete it all as soon as it gains clearance from government authorities. None of the information has appeared in Google’s search engine or on other services, Eustace said.
The latest incident has prompted Google to abandon its effort to collect Wi-Fi network data.
In an apparent show of its commitment to privacy, Google also said it would introduce a new option next week that would let it users encrypt searches on its Web site as an added protection against unauthorized snooping.
North Korea tested nuclear-capable rocket launchers, state media reported yesterday, a day after Seoul detected the launch of about 10 ballistic missiles. The test comes after South Korean and US forces launched their springtime military drills, due to run until Thursday. North Korean leader Kim Jong-un on Saturday oversaw the testing of the multiple rocket launcher system (MRLS), the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said. The test involved 12 600mm-caliber ultra-precision multiple rocket launchers and two artillery companies, it said. Kim said the drill gave Pyongyang’s enemies, within the 420km striking range, a sense of “uneasiness” and “a deep understanding
North Korea yesterday fired about 10 ballistic missiles to the sea toward Japan, the South Korean Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said, days after Pyongyang warned of “terrible consequences” over ongoing South Korea-US military drills. Pyongyang recently dashed hopes of a diplomatic thaw with Seoul, Washington’s security ally, describing its latest peace efforts as a “clumsy, deceptive farce.” Seoul’s military detected “around 10 ballistic missiles launched from the Sunan area in North Korea toward the East Sea [Sea of Japan] at around 1:20pm,” JCS said in a statement, referring to South Korea’s name for the body of water. The missiles
RECOGNITION: Former Fijian prime minister Mahendra Chaudhry said that Taiwan’s New Southbound Policy serves as a stabilizing force in the Indo-Pacific region Taiwan can lead the unification of the Chinese people, Nobel Peace Prize laureate and former Polish president Lech Walesa said in Taipei yesterday, adding that as the world order is changing, peaceful discussion would find good solutions, and that the use of force and coercion would always fail. Walesa made the remarks during his keynote address at a luncheon of the Yushan Forum in Taipei, titled “Indo-Pacific Partnership Prospects: Taiwan’s Values, Technology and Resilience,” organized by the Taiwan-Asia Exchange Foundation with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Walesa said that he had been at the forefront of a big peaceful revolution and “if
‘UNWAVERING FRIENDSHIP’: A representative of a Japanese group that co-organized a memorial, said he hopes Japanese never forget Taiwan’s kindness President William Lai (賴清德) yesterday marked the 15th anniversary of the Tohoku earthquake and tsunami, urging continued cooperation between Taiwan and Japan on disaster prevention and humanitarian assistance. Lai wrote on social media that Taiwan and Japan have always helped each other in the aftermath of major disasters. The magnitude 9 earthquake struck northeastern Japan on March 11, 2011, triggering a massive tsunami that claimed more than 19,000 lives, according to data from Japanese authorities. Following the disaster, Taiwan donated more than US$240 million in aid, making it one of the largest contributors of financial assistance to Japan. In addition to cash donations and
RSS