New Scientist
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Google’s Street View cars have driven into fresh controversy. The company has admitted that the fleet of cars it uses to photograph streets has also been capturing entire email addresses and passwords from wireless routers inside people’s homes.
Google intended to map Wi-Fi routers and cellular network towers. Its aim was to improve the accuracy with which smartphones can work out their location through Google Maps, especially where tall city buildings interfere with GPS signals. The position and signal strength of routers could help pinpoint the phone’s location.
The firm did not make its plans public at the time, but in May, it acknowledged its cars had acquired and recorded the names and ID codes of domestic Wi-Fi networks. Google at first said the data was probably unreadable. Then, last week, it revealed on its official blog that a detailed analysis of the data had recovered entire email addresses, passwords and URLs. Google says it is “mortified”.
Regulators in the US and at least 10 other countries are investigating the company’s privacy practices. The admission “validates and heightens our significant concerns”, Connecticut attorney general Richard Blumenthal told Reuters.
