Google to submit mistakenly collected data, proceed reviews

0 CommentsPrint E-mail Xinhua, May 19, 2010
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Google has agreed to submit all the data collected in Hong Kong by its Street View cars through the Wi-Fi network, including some personal data, and take procedure review, said Hong Kong's Privacy Commissioner for Personal Data Roderick B. Woo on Tuesday.

"Google also accepted our proposal of deleting all data when required by the Commissioner," said Woo, after his meeting with Ross LaJeunesse, the Asia Pacific's Head of Government Affairs in Google, on Tuesday afternoon.

Google admitted last Friday that its Street View cars, which should only collect and record locations of Wi-Fi routers, wrongly collected and recorded non-password protected data that might have included personal data.

Commencing a compliance check on Google from Monday, the Commission also asked the search engine giant to suspend the operation of Street View cars until it is confirmed that it does not collect personal data.

In the meantime, Google promised to proceed with the internal review on procedures and the external independent review of the software that was used in the Street View operation and share with the public the results of such reviews.

Google assured that "it will not allow similar incidents to happen in the future, and will adopt prompt remedial action and review the Street View operation," said Woo.

Launched in 2007, Google Street View is a technology that provides views from various position along streets in the world. The data collected is used to improve Google's location-based services.

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