Slashdot Mirror
Google to Blur Sensitive India Sites
theodp writes "Citing unnamed officials, the Times of India is reporting that Google Earth has agreed to blur and distort Indian locations identified by the government after security concerns were voiced by the country's president. This includes total blurring of locations like government buildings, as well as the outlines/building plans of key facilities. This came about after a recent meeting between Google technicians and Indian officials."
Google Earth has agreed to blur and distort Indian locations
I thought the US government took care of that already, around 1838?
Push Button, Receive Bacon
You can call me crazy, but this sounds like an interesting idea. Sure, it's not the best, but in a country like India, it makes sense. Glad to know Google will listen to a government that doesn't give harsh threats as a welcome.
"I'm a well-wisher, in that I don't wish you any specific harm."
I'm not saying I am afraid of it happening (I'm not that hysterically moronic, yet.) but it seems to me that the premise of "Google must blur this building because terrorists could somehow benefit from already slightly blurred photos of the outline of the building." applies equally to my house - "Google must blur this area because burglars could use the pictures to plan an escape route along the back of the garden which is hidden from normal view."
The last thing I want to have to do is put an opaque roof over my greenhouse shrine to Peter Krause.
I saw him heading towards your house with a ten pound sledge hammer, a bottle of ketchup and a food processor. He had a funny look on his face. I'm sure you'll be fine.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
tide of free information. The little dutch boy approach won't 'hold water' in the age of ever increasing amounts of data. Data that wants to be free, or freely sold to the highest bidder. What should be happening, and probably is, is that such photo services' data should be used by those that want to hide things, ensuring that they have done their hiding correctly.
If you want to be sure that nobody steals your identity, don't give it to anyone for any reason, or better yet, always pretend to be someone else. Same applies to sensitive infrastructure. The problem with trying to hide information is that you tell people where to look more intensely. This simply puts a big target on those areas for local spy work. It doesn't take much to find out what you want to know about most places, if they aren't hidden or protected with the same efforts as is Area 51. Even if Google blurs the pictures, China won't, nor will any other government with a space presence.
I think the whole thing is either a ruse, or just another example of people thinking they can regulate the Internet or its uses.
Support NYCountryLawyer RIAA vs People
I put trying to modify world geography to make a buck pretty high on my "what counts as evil" scale. That's Bond-villian level there.
I think this is the truth behind all this histery coming from governments directed at internet companies which try to make information freely available (or available in a less-restrictive way).
I somehow think that this situation is analogous to other governments trying coerce Google into providing their user's personal details or removing content that is legal under US law, despite being illegal in other countries (e.g. hate speech).
Governments are losing their power and they're not liking it. This time Google decided they could drop them a cookie or something, you know, just to show some good faith. I'd prefer if they didn't blur anything, though - would make me respect Google a little bit more (but I don't think this will make them automatically evil or anything like that).
Terrorists will just ask their computer to "enhance"
I did a Google-image-search the other day, and what do you know: some of the images from Japan were heavily pixellated in rather sensitive areas!
sig? Oh, that sig...
I doubt that india is concerned about the CIA - obviously the US government has the capability to take images that are many times the resolution of Google Maps. They are probably concerned about countries that don't have high resolution satellite imagery. Like, say, Pakistan, who has supported Islamic terror groups in attacks against India?
This isn't about security. It's about being able to say that you've done something about something.
In this case something very important about security. This is what politicians do to profile them self. It really doesn't matter what they do and what they do it to, but at the moment "security" is the cheap way to do something. Mostly because it's so damn hard to prove that the measures are ineffective. It's impossible to prove that blurring some images *didn't* foil some terrorists plans.
Being able to say that you got google to do something that you wanted them to do, is just an added bonus in the "look how important I am" hat.
TC - My Photos..
How long it'll be before large numbers of businesses paint advertisments on their roofs and parking lots? The more people use the service the more the planet is likely to start looking like one large web page. It's already happening in a small way but I'm guessing there'll be an explosion of businesses taking advantage of the free advertizing. Then does Google demand they pay up or get blurred?
Huh ? Do they realize these satellite and aerial photos (high-res areas are actually photographed from planes not satellites) can be freely and relatively anonymously purchased by anyone from companies such as NAVTEQ ? Blurring sensitive areas in Google Earth/Maps is not going to stop "evil" people from getting access to unedited photos...
Wouldn't really make a difference to terrorist militaries (you know, the ones that target clearly-marked Red Cross ambulances and the like).
comma
From TFA: Official sources said Google Earth would distort building plans by adding structures where none existed or masking certain aspects of a facility. This could be done without attracting attention to such establishments, which range from laboratories, mines, military sites, space and atomic centres and residences of high-profile VVIPs.
Please stand clear of the doors, por favor mantenganse alejado de las puertas
One doesn't need to see that an area is blurred out on a Satellite picture to know that it's a government facility. You could just look at the big metal or stone sign in front of the building. Or military uniforms.
Really, though, people who want to do a government harm don't have to discover targets. Real estate is slow, and governments are slower still. If a building was used by a government 20 years ago, it's likely still used by that government today. That puts the ownership of the building into the "common knowledge" category.
tasks(723) drafts(105) languages(484) examples(29106)
Google targeting plugin I figured Pakistan would pay good money for itl
actually I am happy to see you, however that is in fact a banana in my pocket.
. . . paint a big sign on your roof that says, "This is not my house."
"If your parents never had children, chances are you wonât either." -Dick Cavett
If you read the article, it actually says that the images would be carefully camaflouged, not just blurred. So, you see low res pics or you see buildings etc that are not actually there. This has been done to various US military installations already (and even the white house)... so it's nothing new really.
:-)
Quoting from the article
" Official sources said Google Earth would distort building plans by adding structures where none existed or masking certain aspects of a facility. This could be done without attracting attention to such establishments, which range from laboratories, mines, military sites, space and atomic centres and residences of high-profile VVIPs. "
The main reason why this was done was because India's President (a highly respected man and very intelligent) was worried that such high resolution imagery could pose security implications.
I personally think that this will help reduce access to terrorists that may be planning attacks. It is nothing against major governments that already have all the satellite information that they need. A bit too much info actually.. as the US found out when India blasted their nuclear device right under everyone's noses
Even without censorship, not all locations on Google Earth have the same amount of resolution. Urban areas in 'non-third-world nations', in general, have the highest resolution. So blurring (or obscuring) per se isn't an issue, unless there are complete blanks for certain areas. Which is not the case here, presumably.
More than mere navel gazing.
It's like playing whack-a-mole against every source including blogs and online photo album sites.
And besides, it's just security through obscurity, and we all know very well how much that strategy works well.
You can keep secret a small password, you can't keep secret the outside structure of a whole building, that any plane / sattelite / hot-air balloon / small probe / home made autonomous mini-glider with a webcame stuck on it / etc... could see. Google is listening to a government that is controlling most of the (outsourced) IT infrastructure of Google's home country.
I think it's wise not to disturb the sleeping Tiger in those circumstances.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
"blurring doesn't increase security" messages. The location of such buildings in any country is not a secret. The goal is to make figuring out further details, such as the exact dimensions of the buildings, a little more difficult. Everyone but /. realizes that getting sensitive data is not impossible, but that does not mean you go and put it up online and make it easily searchable.
They do realize that people can see the buildings by just driving near them, right?
Comment removed based on user account deletion
So now, not only Google but also the terrorists would know which key Indian establishments are located where:
Key establishment is a blurred spot!
Who knows how complete is the list of key establishments provided to google?
Also, there are techniques to get information about the real image out of blurred images. This link http://dheera.net/projects/blur.php is only about numbers but I'm sure there are other ways to get more information out of blurred images.