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Google Street View Logs Wi-Fi Networks, MAC Addresses
An anonymous reader points to this story at The Register that says "Google is collecting more than just images when they drive around for the Street View service. 'Google's roving Street View spycam may blur your face, but it's got your number. The Street View service is under fire in Germany for scanning private WLAN networks, and recording users' unique MAC (Media Access Control) addresses, as the car trundles along.' There's a choice quote at the end: 'Google CEO Eric Schmidt recently said Internet users shouldn't worry about privacy unless they have something to hide.'"
... that it has just been 'Googled'.
... and reeks of Google's Buzz privacy blunders all over again.
... except for that they're doing it for tens of thousands of personal and business WiFi networks.
This doesn't look good on the surface
Why can't Google (and everyone else for that matter) just stick to the personal data people are foolish enough to hand over to the web? This type of action puts them on the edge of WiFi hackers who are "just seeing if it could be done"
Wow. That's pretty shitty reporting, even for The Register. Yes, Google records SSIDs and (I guess) MAC addresses of wifi APs. That way they can estimate your position for Google Maps on a mobile device, even if you have no GPS on that device. This has been public knowledge for at least a year now.
In regards to Streetview itself and recording SSIDs and such, there is simply no privacy concerns. When you are in public, people can see you. When you broadcast signals, people can receive them. If you don't want to be seen, don't go out in public. If you don't want people to see the SSID of your AP, don't broadcast it.
How we know is more important than what we know.
'Google CEO Eric Schmidt recently said internet users shouldn't worry about privacy unless they have something to hide.'
What could I possibly have to hide, other than the fact that I'm wardriving around people's neighbourhoods? Oh no, wait a second...
Google Maps provides WLAN-based location triangulation, on both phones and wi-fi capable computers. To do that, they look up the MAC addresses of visible wi-fi hotspots in a location database. Google is not the only company that does this via wardriving, and they at last have the sense to keep it secure enough that nobody can just look up your MAC address and get your geographic location. Unlike certain other wi-fi positioning systems.
No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
If I don't have anything to hide, then what logical reason do you have to spy on me?
Of course this applies to private companies just as much as government.
'Google CEO Eric Schmidt recently said internet users shouldn't worry about privacy unless they have something to hide.'
And what if I DO have something to hide? Will you then remove me from all of your databases and registers?
mov ax, 4c00h
int 21h
Well isn't that the cutest thing.
If you agree to pay a small monthly fee Google will not publicly display any personal information gathered from street view, including Mac addresses, photos of people leaving and entering premises and items found in routine garbage search.
'Google CEO Eric Schmidt recently said internet users shouldn't worry about privacy unless they have something to hide.'
This is the same argument conservatives made right before they instituted warrantless wiretaps and body searching old ladies at the airport.
No, actually, he said that if you have $SOMETHING to hide then doing stuff concerned with $SOMETHING on t'internet is not a smart idea.
I know I'm supposed to be outraged about Street View. I'm trying, I really am. But the outrage just isn't there.
It's (generally) not illegal to take one picture of a storefront from your car. It's not illegal to take two, or three. Nor is it illegal to put those pictures on the internet. Google is just taking this process and deploying it on a larger scale than anyone previously had the resources for. I think it's the same with wireless networks. YOU have chosen to blast your MAC address into the ether for anyone within a certain radius to record, so why should you be surprised when someone does?
Google is just acting as an army of men with clipboards, no single one of whom is doing anything wrong, and for me it doesn't follow that there's something wrong when they do it en masse, provided they stick to public roads and take the privacy precautions (blurring faces, etc.) they have been.
Dislike the Electoral College? Lobby your state to join the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact.
Quickly! Change all your MAC Addresses and SSIDs! That'll confuse 'em... Mwuhahahaaa. Yes, Google. I do live in Spain...
Google had been giving out locations based on WiFi signals for a long time... How did you think it worked if not by knowing where various WiFi hot spots were? Any one who is surprised by the fact that Google has a database of WiFi hot spots and their location please explain to me what magic Google was using to get locations from WiFi...
It seems people tend to use the "nothing to hide" argument when they have something sneaky planned.
**Posting anonymously because I've got plenty to hide**
That "quote" is somewhat disingenuous. For most news sources, i wouldn't care, but when it comes from The Register, or Light Reading (a/k/a The Enquirer of fiber optics), I want an exact quote -- because they're far too prone to insinuation and putting spin on things the way they want them to be perceived.
The privacy concern is that Google is building a massive database of SSIDs -- this is not the same as your neighbors being able to see your SSID, this is a corporation with global reach.
This is the same sort of problem that we complain about when a company collects little bits of information that you leak in public, and builds a dossier on you. Yes, the information is technically public, but the fact that it is being assembled en masse is the problem. It is impossible to hide ever detail of your life from view, but when such a large database is built up, it reveals a lot about a person, potentially including things they did not want revealed.
Palm trees and 8
Googles just finding out how many networks there are out there for their google phones to not need any carrier sign up.
Full built in voip
.There's a choice quote at the end: 'Google CEO Eric Schmidt recently said internet users shouldn't worry about privacy unless they have something to hide.'
OK, let me take the learned man's position and agree that I have something to hide...so I should worry. Is it a crime to have something to hide? I thought not.
Now what? Yes, I have something to hide so I am worried about my privacy....so just go away Google. Just go away. Will you just leave me and my "stuff" alone please.
Can you please explain how wardriving is not evil?
Oh, and, by the way, off course I do have something to hide. That is why it is called privacy.
Nae king! Nae laird! Nae yurrupiean pressedent! We willna be fooled again!
I wonder if they are going to drive further to East Europe, post Soviet countries in particular as Google Maps services seem to be kinda dead for those.. not yet profitable ?
Whatever happened to 'don't be evil'?
Or does it only apply when it suits Google?
How on earth can you map the MAC (of assuming you wireless router) to a facebook account? Besides, it's the MAC which might be visible (don't know if it is) in the WIFI data a different one that the MAC used by the external interface which connects to the ISP?
Oh dear, I wish he hadn't said that. I hope he does too. Even quoted a bit out of context (it was possibly a flip tagline), when you direct activities at the biggest datalogger around and have capabilities that most people regard as extremely penetrating, you just do not say anything that might scare people. Bad for business.
Many people do not understand why privacy is a right. As he says "Why worry if you have nothing to hide?" It is not from nothing: One word answer: PREJUDICE. Privacy is basically a right of self defense against prejudice (and malice too, for that matter). We all have good reason to be concerned about the impression we make upon others since they can often make arbitrary decisions that affect our interests.
Of course others have a right to relevant information, but we have a right to control how much beyond we choose to present, and to whom. We do have a right to be treated as individuals. Not products of some correlation -- statistics is _descriptive_, not prescriptive.
so I guess only people unsavvy enough to use MACs will have their addresses recorded! Whew!
creation science book
I don't use a Mac!*
* joke's on Slashdot too. They say Mac in the title instead of MAC.
I don't have a mac address. I use PCs.
rewriting history since 2109
Well said.
Google CEO Eric Schmidt recently said internet users shouldn't worry about privacy unless they have something to hide.'
YOU don't have anything to actively search there in the first place.
He is hypocritical...
Check out the following article:
http://news.cnet.com/Google-balances-privacy,-reach/2100-1032_3-5787483.html?tag=nl
Reaction from Google? CNET is barred one year from google.
http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/Google-Angry-at-CNET-66164
"You can't make a race horse of a pig"
"No," said Samuel, "but you can make very fast pig"
I submitted this a while ago after reading http://www.outflux.net/blog/archives/2010/01/24/google-is-wardriving/trackback/.
Using the Freedom of Speech while I still have it.
Because for sure you have nothing to hide!
What they are doing is not even questionable, it is completely legal.
Do you know much about German law?
Because in the USA it IS questionable and in some cities it is ILLEGAL.
How do people use public wireless, then? They have to enter all the information manually, as opposed to scanning and just picking out the right SSID?
Could you post some of the case law / legal statutes involved? Thanks!
there is no such thing as privacy, get used to it.
He was in a position to know which way the wind was blowing, and he called it, correctly.
Now I wonder what soundbite we will be hearing in 2020?
http://slashdot.org/~GuyFawkes/journal
Street View pictures to brief agents for action,
WiFi Hotspots for communication,
maybe also for eavesdropping.
google queries to see who looks for what
and even steering who sees what as a query answer.
-
no wonder China threw them out!
Isn't his pretty much the exact same thing that Skyhook has been doing for several years now? They've even been reported on on this very site, and yet the outrage, while there, wasn't nearly as bad as you guys seem to be going over Google doing this. It's nothing new, and consistency in how you direct your anger gives your argument that much more credence.
Sen. Joe Biden (D) hinted at the "unique serial numbers" from the person's computer that p2p Fair play tracking software records.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-10784_3-9920665-7.html
If this all connects together, someone has a worldwide passive database of useful links to computers or network cards.
You have files and public MAC addresses with timestamps.
Forget the ID of a suspect, just the propagation data could track a file down to a usable sneak and peek level.
Someone has put a lot of effort into finding the almost unique ID that stays with a product over its life, the Media Access Control number and down every street.
This closes the 'wireless hole' - the neighbour who got wireless and used weak or known or old security and allowed others to use their networks.
The strange MAC was noted, but never traced. A laptop is cleaned, sold on ebay and resurfaces.
Now an old MAC is linked to a new owner and the past seller used a CC?.
How are they detecting new MACs now would be my question?
Google and Fair play tracking gave the feds a historical snapshot, where are the new device numbers leaking out?
If you have vital data the lesson seems to be - stay away from networked computers
and return to family, friends, tribe, gang or enterprise -
the NSA had your parents fax, phone, google/the CIA has your MACs.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
Why not write some scripts for rotating your access points MAC address and maybe SSID. You'll never mess stuff up by changing the MAC address periodically, but obviously all clients must know about SSID changes. You could run the same algorithm for choosing the SSID on all your wireless devices, create some client for finding the new SSID address, or change rarely enough that manual updates aren't annoying.
The Christian religion has been and still is the principal enemy of moral progress in the world. -- Bertrand Russell
" unique Mac (Media Access Control) "
If I don't know what a MAC address is, then that's still not a lot of help. Wouldn't it make more sense to say what a MAC address is rather than what it stands for?
Correct me if I'm wrong, but this isn't anything new and at least a couple of companies already do this exact same thing. Go to Maps on your iPod touch and hit Locate. It'll put you right on the map and it doesn't have anything resembling a GPS chip in it. And let's say that you're standing in a field of 4 "linksys" and 5 "NETGEAR". It knows the MACs that are linked to those SSIDs, so it can look at the signal strength of each and triangulate your position. In fact, access to a service like this is built in to Location Services in Snow Leopard.
What they are doing is not even questionable, it is completely legal.
That's true here in the US. Existence of companies like Skyhook and the iPod Touch's location feature make that evident. The question is if it's legal in Germany.
Not that it shouldn't be, particularly when an AP is metaphorically screaming,
Hello there, anyone who can hear me!
My name is Linksys!
You can tell me apart from other folks with the same name because I'm XX:YY:ZZ:AA:BB:CC!
If you like, I can give you an IPv4 address!
No, no, I haven't been told to exclude anyone who doesn't know my favorite word or phrase!
Please talk to me! I love you!
Here in the States, logging that you heard such a declaration rightly isn't against the law. Further, based on my very crude analogy, I also don't think that "unauthorized" connection/use of an unprotected/unconfigured AP should be a criminal offense either. Perhaps if someone learns that their pipe is being used against their knowledge, they could (and should) take civil action to force that person to pay for what he's been freeloading on, but I digress.
... Sorry about this, but unless you speak Italian and ol' Tony tells you what my favorite word or phrase is, I can't give you an IPv4 addres!" Any situation where network encryption is either bypassed or broken without the network owner's knowledge and permission is nefarious outright, regardless of intention, and that should most definitely be a criminal offense. Although if ol' Tony finds out before the cops do, you're probably even worse off.
For someone who actually breaks in to an encrypted AP (and yes, WEP counts), consider that WEP might be like a retarded-midget bouncer who'll believe you if you lie to him, whereas WPA could be, "My name is Linksys
Boot Windows, Linux, and ESX over the network for free.
I can just see Google Maps now - "We have found you are near wifi access point Linksys. We have narrowed your location down to one of these 1,232,342 locations."
"Mac" is a brand of computers.
"MAC" is Media Access Control.
You wouldn't have to explain acronyms if you capitalized them correctly in the first place.
Isn't the phrase "WLAN networks" a bit redundant (as in "wireless local area network networks")?
Google must having something to hide by encrypting access to their servers. Fortunately that didn't stop the Chinese from invading their privacy. I seriously hope this was misquoted, because if it isn't, I have officially declared Google and evil company. I'm really disappointed.
in soviet russia, google searches you
Wait! You mean that if I have a device that's emitting a signal out in to the public world, I should expect no one to jot that down?! If you're that concerned about privacy, turn of your wireless access point. You are pumping your private stuff out in to the world.
...What me Worry? Why pretend? Privacy is a quaint self delusion - its nothing to hide any more. Let it all hang out. There's nothing too insignificant for the data stream, or the cyber-porta-potty. We're all registered text offenders.
The "unless you have something to hide" argument is fodder for sheep. The founding fathers of the United States of America had things to hide from the British. There may very well come another day when the Sons of Liberty need to once again take out a government that has become complacent about it's responsibility to honorably govern it's people.
Mr. Schmidt your philosophy is dead wrong. Why fight for freedom for people in China and enslave the rest of the world in digital shackles.
Hope is the currency of fools
In another ominous development, the phone company is planning to release a compiled document containing every name, address, and phone number of all their wired clients. The books will be published by region but be available globally. They'll be called by the disturbing name "White Pages".
They also will provide a charge-per-call service wherein on a request from not only government agencies but also private citizens, they will mining their data stores nationally in search of a particular individuals detailed info. While there is no clear consensus on this point, it appears this service will either be called 'Information' or mysteriously... just '411'.
They claim there will be an 'opt-out' option, but it will not be enabled by default, and there will be an extra charge for it's use.
Just some perspective to apply, not really meant as humor. This issue is about as dangerous as the phone book IMHO. You've got (or should have) an option in your router to hide your SSID. If you aren't using it, then you are BROADCASTING it. If someone tracking this information centrally really concerns you, change your SSID randomly every 30 days, and the MAC of your router. If your router doesn't support changing it's MAC, get a better one.
If it REALLY concerns you, don't use WiFi! There are much more nefarious things that can be done against WiFi than just logging an SSID/MAC that might actually be worth worrying about (again, IMHO).
You can play hide and seek only if you add the "no bots" tag to your header, otherwise your soul gets indexed and cached. Would you like fries with that blue pill Neo?
Therefore, I'm free to decrypt satellite TV and get HBO for free, right? After all, the signal is OUT THERE, so large corporations should fully expect me to decode it on my own and play it through my TV.
Why is it that corporations expect privacy, but citizens should not expect it?
If telephones are outlawed, then only outlaws will have telephones.
say for example you have a small wireless LAN, and if someone drives by and parks within a city block of your LAN and trys to connect it would be a good idea to have an alarm notify you of a new connection that puts a popup and plays a sound file from any of the PCs you have on your LAN.
Politics is Treachery, Religion is Brainwashing
Communist mastermind Karl Marx famously wrote that at a certain amount, quantity becomes a new quality, i.e. a crate of apple is just apple, but 1000 crates of apple is an agricultural commerce venture. The same thing is the problem with Google, because they have the huge quantity, being able to finance a world-wide spy-driving campaign with many spy-cars and in the end a new quality will emerge, which will be the one and only "private NSA".
Google, the private NSA will have unprecedented over our lifes and they will be able to adjust our lives via manipulation. In the end "do no evil" becomes "war is peace" and freedom of thought and will will be a thing of the past.
Now, occasionally you might get some pervs, but in general it illustrates the point that privacy is a good thing and we should be jealous about guarding it!
RobotBox - Robot projects from around the world
I see morons all the time who write "MAC" when they mean "Mac", but I think this is the first time I've seen the reverse mistake.
Media that can be recorded and distributed can be recorded and distributed.
-kfg
No, actually, he said that if you have $SOMETHING to hide then doing stuff concerned with $SOMETHING on t'internet is not a smart idea.
I'm all about skewering the brazen enemies of privacy and unreasonable searches. But when the Register article provided a paraphrasing and NOT a direct quote, you can color me skeptical. I would really like to read a direct quote, not a journalist's attempt to paraphrase or twist words (not that I've ever known journalists to do this *cough*). MancunianMaskMan, where did you get your alternate wording? Do you also have a direct quote source?
I only post comments when someone on the internet is wrong.
How much of a privacy concern is a global map of Wifi-router MAC addresses? The article (yes, I RTF) makes it sound as if knowing your router's Wifi MAC address could help to connect your online activities to your address (or even just router). But if the network is not open they would not know your public IP address and hence could not really associate the router with users of the network. Especially, if the router is different from the modem (which has it's own MAC address). There could, of course be a Trojan or something on the computer you're using that lets others know which router your computer uses, but this is a more sophisticated thread scenario.
So, how is a global (even if it was public) database of MAC addresses of routers a privacy concern?
Why can't Google (and everyone else for that matter) just stick to the personal data people are foolish enough to hand over to the web? This type of action puts them on the edge of WiFi hackers who are "just seeing if it could be done"
They aren't doing it for the sake of doing it. This data has a pretty specific usage. And might already be enhancing your "Google Maps" experience on your smartphone.
All this data is actually used for locations.
In addition to classical GPS-signal-based positioning, another less precise but still possible way to do positionning is tower-based : (as done in the first gen iPhones, for exemple) check which GSM/3G towers (and respective signal strength) a phone is seeing within its range. Based on this list a crude position can be approximated, if the actual coordinates of the towers are known.
Google is simply extending the same process to another type of emiters which can also have fixed positions : Wireless routers.
And indeed this is already implemented in several devices : Palm Pre's WebOS can use Google's location service to determine position (thus using the crude cell tower and wifi router based method until a nice GPS signal can be locked). And in fact, the device can even be configured to answer back which towers/routers it has seen to help improve the service.
Also note that they aren't even *trying* to connect to the routers. They are just recording the informations that are emitted by the routers as part of the WiFi specifications. The MAC addresses aren't even published. Just used for locations services.
Complaining about this is just as silly as complaining that Google records the house numbers on the street as it drives by. Or the outrages that you can read in the non specialist press about this or that company being able to "see you IP address" (of course idiots, that's part of a normal TCP/IP transaction !).
If you don't want your MAC address to be visible, turn of Wifi. If you want Wifi, the MAC address *will have* to be visible in your neighbourhood - it's part of the way wifi works. Google is just building a map of such neighbourhood so people can get locations even if GPS signal is hard to lock.
If you *REALLY* want to be paranoid about something, try first stoping your phone's bluetooth staying in "always discoverable" mode. There's way much more privacy problems linked to a visible Bluetooth than anything else.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
If Google knows everyone's MAC addresses they can hax your IP's!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It's not like they were driving around with aircrack, only collecting data that was freely(though probably unknowingly) broadcasted unencrypted. There was an article on /., a few months ago about a man who wrote a simple script for his laptop to do almost the same thing (all he gathered was the ssid of the ap's) and there wasn't an enormous outcry then. I look forward to seeing the results published, but hopefully not in such a way that google maps will publish the location of unprotected networks.
Don't change naked in your house with the curtains open if you don't want anyone to see.
It's more like:
...etc., etc.
"I'm linksys! I'm linksys!"
"No, I'm linksys!"
"I'm linksys!"
"I'm linksys!"
My friends and I all have a wifi router swap program. We each have 2 routers (WRT54G) and we keep one active until google wardrives them then we mail them off to the next person in the list. And he mails you one that google tagged as being elsewhere in the country.
if you are in front of my house, google will tell you that you are in Southern California (1500 miles away)
(no this post is not actually true)
We're logging it.
I learned the hard way that Googles "Do no evil" is more like.. "dont get caught doing evil"
Their recording of SSID/Mac's is not limited passive scanning (i.e just wireless networks that broadcast)... They are very active in collecting this info (and they do not limit it to just Mac addresses for AP's.. they collect every mac they "see")
'In the Netherlands, the effort at establishing a comprehensive ... These registration systems and the related identity cards played
population registration system for administrative and statistical
purposes was completed even before the Nazi-occupation (Methorst,
1936; Thomas, 1937). In 1938 H. W. Methorst, who was then the
director-general of the Dutch Central Bureau of Statistics and
formerly also head of the Dutch office of population registration,
reported on the rapid progress being made in the Netherlands in
implementing a new comprehensive system of population registration
that would follow each person "from cradle to grave" and open "wide
perspectives for simplification of municipal administration and at the
same time social research" (1938: 713-714)...
an important role in the apprehension of Dutch Jews and Gypsies prior
to their eventual deportation to the death camps. Dutch Jews had the
highest death rate (73 percent) of Jews residing in any occupied
western European country--far higher than the death rate among the
Jewish population of Belgium (40 percent) and France (25 percent), for
example."
source:
"The Dark Side of Numbers: The Role of Population Data Systems in
Human Rights Abuses." Social Research, Summer, 2001, by William
Seltzer, Margo Anderson, hosted by findarticles.com:
http://www.findarticles.com/cf_dls/m2267/2_68/77187772/p4/article.jhtml?term=
"Kill 'em all and let Root sort 'em out"
The Location API in the iPhone andiPod touch has been using this data since the devices were introduced. In Apple's case, they use the Skyhook API.
XPS leverages Wi-Fi access point information to accurately determine location information in dense urban areas or indoor environments.
Google Earth on the iPhone/iPod uses this API to determine location. In the case of the iPod, Skyhook is all the location info available.
Google is no doubt doing the same project themselves for their own location API for Android.
Nothing new here, just a politician making hay. Move along.
Edith Keeler Must Die
Ok, ok, it's in German. But the article in "Spiegel" starts out by implying this is no big deal. Here's a quick'n'dirty translation of the first bit:
"It sounds momentous: The commissioner for privacy, Peter Schaar, said in a press release that 'Google street view vehicles are equipped with WLAN scanners'. He further explains that he is 'horrified by the purposes to which these scans...are being put'."
The article then goes on to say that a little research reveals that this is all well-known and has been since 2008. This is all legal in Germany, and in fact there are other companies and organizations that do similar things. The article itself mainly informs the user of the general situation, and asks a couple of open questions. In particular, it worries that some over-reacting judge may declare MAC-addresses to be related to personal identity, and therefore subject to privacy regulations.
In a nutshell, it's much ado about nothing, basically a clueless commissioner decides to try to make a name for himself.
Enjoy life! This is not a dress rehearsal.
That is a racist statement.
Yes, I too used to think wireless wiretaps were bad. But today is a new day, and I have learned the error of my ways. Anyone who is opposed to wireless wiretaps in this day and age is clearly racist.
I hear all the people saying "If you don't want your MAC known, don't broadcast it!".
I agree, to some extent. But I'll pose a question of terminology:
TV content distributors use satellites to distribute content. They're also "screaming it into public space". But if you use that (and maybe decrypt it), you're hijacking a service; you're a criminal. So that's what I'll do with my SSID/MAC. I'll call it a service. If you use without permission, you're breaking the law. If you reproduce it without permission, I'll sue you for millions. That would effectively make Google "pirates". How cool would that be? Harr.
"Google is not doing any individual act that's illegal, and isn't doing anything in aggregate that's illegal"
That *very* much depends on where you live. In the UK, for instance, that MAC address may well be classed as personal information (because it's a unique code on a product that a person owns and thus links the product manufacturer (MAC prefix), possibly the product type and an address of a personal residence - Google already has to blank out car number plates because of this, what's different between that and a MAC?) and thus subject to the Data Protection Act - WHETHER OR NOT that information is easily available to anyone and "broadcast" to everyone. In some countries, there are legal precedents that say that even *trying* to connect to a wireless network that you don't own is an unlawful intrusion (to stop people piggybacking on other's wifi without permission)... Google may well not be doing just a passive scan of the local area.
Just because America has crap laws against these things, it doesn't mean other places have. And Germany probably has some of the tightest personal information laws in the EU.
There's a choice quote at the end: 'Google CEO Eric Schmidt recently said Internet users shouldn't worry about privacy unless they have something to hide.'
I think I heard something similar come our of Germany in the early 40's.
I'm not looking forward to the day when our two Google founders cash out. They currently have enough control to keep this idiot CEO in check, but when they lose that control I forsee a hostile takeover by Schmidt. I get the mental image that he sits in his office all day fuming over how he's not allowed to shoot Google's 5 year prospects into the crapper for a 25% profit increase this year (which is more than attainable by playing dirty with the information they hold).
My privacy!
Get of my lawn google - you are becoming evil!
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
This is about privacy.
I think if i go and sit accross your house and put down the times you enter and leave the house and publish this on my blog (that is ad-sponsored) you would think different. If i make a note also if you locked your door (WEP or WPA2) then you would become a little more suspicious.
A special note is made
Then i keep this data for 10 year. Anyone who is interested can buy it or browse it.
But i have to stop now, google anology police is knocking on my door.
Is this illegal? That is where privacy starts and passwords stop.
I have a lot to hide. Don't you?
I have a lot to hide from future governments, which may (and often do) decide that what are presently both legal and moral activities, are in fact neither.
I have a lot to hide from future societies, which may (and often do) decide that my opinions and actions are punishable by exclusion and death.
-- 'The' Lord and Master Bitman On High, Master Of All
Let's say you are Evil P(ublic|rivate) Entity (EPE), and you've got the run of Google's wardriving results. So you know that there's an access point called "BigDaddy" with a MAC of 99:99:99:99:99:99:99:00 located roughly at Secor and Alexis in Toledo. What can you do with this knowledge? What can you correlate it with?
Since EPEs exist to do evil, please give a scenario where this datum enables their core mission. If you can't, this is all pretty silly, isn't it?
"with their freedom lost all virtue lose" - Milton
' There's a choice quote at the end: 'Google CEO Eric Schmidt recently said Internet users shouldn't worry about privacy unless they have something to hide.'" Wait a second...Me thinks Google has been an undercover government operation... very covert... hmm.. oh sorry for that I meant THE NEXT GOVERNMENT's covert operation.
"Computers are a lot like Air Conditioners" "They both work great until you start opening Windows"
Look, Google is making a bunch of money right now without really compromising anyone's privacy.
facebook, meanwhile, has 100x more personal details then google could ever hope to have, but is not really compromising anyone's privacy, and doesn't make any money. in fact it loses money.
Bottom line, if you are going to worry about privacy, be worried about facebook. that zuckerberg is a real prick.
'course he's got all the privacy money can buy. Gated community, solicitor on tap, private police.
This isn't that big a deal really because we SHOULD all be using a router of some kind in our homes and business's to block any outside attempts to see our actual machines. Let me guess that most of the IP's collected are 192.168.0.1? WOW that was hard.
"Do you know how dumb average is?" - Peggy Hill
First, this isn't really personal data. It's something you are BROADCASTING. If you use wireless you are sending a signal out over the public air waves. It doesn't magically stop at the border of your yard, it goes out over the public street, your neighbors yards, etc... Do you have a right to control what happens to something you have already sent out into public spaces? Do you think you actually know how far your signal travels? Someone with a better antenna than that crappy one built into your netbook can pick it up a lot farther than you can. Distance will also vary from day to day based on atmospheric conditions, the solar cycle and voodoo. There is nothing private about an SSID or a WiFi MAC address. If you are paranoid then buy some CAT5 or 6 and STFU.
The only way this information could hurt you is if you are relying on MAC filtering to keep people out. If so then it is YOUR OWN STUPID FAULT if someone gets on your network. (and for some reason it seems like the majority of people who claim to be tech savy that I know do this). If you want to keep your network to yourself then enable WPA. That's it! Stop Whining! Anybody can pick up your MAC to use for spoofing later. What difference does it make if Google has already done it. See that jogger going by, is that a WiFi enabled cellphone in his pocket?
On the other hand. It should not be required that you keep your network to yourself. It's YOUR NETWORK. If someone does leave a network open it could be because they chose to. I know people who do this. I've known people who set up Neighborhood LANs with forum pages like a modern version of a local BBS. I'm sure they would love to see Google help inform their neighbors about it. Honestly, if someone wants to share their internet access I don't think they should be stopped either.
In today's paranoid environment it might not be the best idea to share internet access since someone might use it for something illegal but that is really too bad. It's not like the people who are up to no good won't just find another way. I can't imagine a better defense against government censorship and ISP non-net-neutrality than a nice big interconnected mesh network owned and operated by the individual users. Someone cataloging local WiFi information is a nice step towards that future.
Perhaps we should ask Eric Schmidt for his ATM card number and pin. We all have things to hide. It's called privacy. More than that, it's necessary in a civilized society
When I hear someone say that you shouldn't be afraid to talk to the police unless you're guilty or that you shouldn't be afraid to let things known unless you're doing something wrong, or similar nonsense, I say, "tell that to Richard Jewell." In case you don't know, the late Richard Jewell was a security guard at the Atlanta Olympics who found a backpack bomb and got people out of the way and prevented certain injury to many people, possibly loss of life to some. In short, he did his job admirably. For which he got crucified by the press and the FBI, as rumors spread that the planted the device. He ended up suing a number of papers and got settlements. So for those that claim someone shouldn't be secretive or silent if they're not doing something wrong, I have a response for them.
On the subject, if you think talking to the police won't hurt you when you're innocent, spend 45 minutes watching these two videos, the first by a law professor and a police detective's rebuttal, who agrees with everything he said.
The lessons of history teach us - if they teach us anything - that nobody learns the lessons that history teaches us.
Their motto is, "Do no evil," so they can't be doing anything sinister. Plus, they gave me free web services, so they must all be really nice guys. Surely they're not going to do anything to hurt us...
Read my blog. Or not. Whatever.
....THIS kind of thing is the reason why I actively opt NOT to get that shiny new wireless router/modem for my home network whenever my DSL service tries to push it on me. It's bad enough how vulnerable ANY network is to prying eyes, but this is akin to pinning a C-note to one's tail and yelling to the world "KY is optional, come and get it!" My hardware may be terribly outdated, but at least it takes a bit more than "being in the neighborhood" to access my system, I mean, c'mon, at least use a trojan for access, folks. Sheesh!
I address the US because A) That's where Google is and B) The question of whether or not Google is or is not currently violating any laws in countries around the world has less import than whether or not a new way of looking at privacy as a concept is needed.
Obviously if what Google's doing is illegal where they're doing it, they should stop or face the consequences.
But I'm not aware of any country with a comprehensive set of privacy laws addressing aggregated, inferred, or derived data use to avoid privacy violations. Are you?
It is obvious that Google is attempting to be the yellow pages of the internet by logging MAC addresses as well as actual location.
People have been using the “it’s in public” argument here, but there is a difference between in public and only easily accessible by your close neighbours, and accessible by the whole world. What if Google started coming by and scanning with an infra-red camera? Would you respond by telling people that their body heat is radiating out through the walls and can be detected from the street- therefore it’s public!? If you don’t want someone using an infra-red camera you should have built your walls differently ?! Come on. Not everything that is out in public should be open for anyone to collect and do whatever they want with.
What I want to know is - WHY is Google doing this? "Just because they can" is not enough of an answer.
I wonder if Eric Schmidt goes to the bathroom with door open. If not, what are you hiding Eric?
Welcome to the future of the social web!
Download the Google Wardrive client to your PDA, and pre-cracked WEP/WPA2-TKIP keys will be automatically loaded as necessary, providing you with high-speed Wifi connectivity wherever you go! This service is totally free!*
*Google Wardrive connections use Google DNS. Traffic may be monitored for data relevant to advertisers.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
Isn't this just wardriving?
They collect your SSID and router's wifi MAC, they don't connect to your router, the don't have your machine's MAC, they don't have IP addresses.
ASCII stupid question, get a stupid ANSI
So much for do no evil. Google is loosing it. What happened? Power corrupts? Absolute power...
Google is becoming Skynet.. We should start a resistance now.. Now, let me Google search for John Connor..
And 3D anaglyph street images, too.
Kriston
I don't get it.
The number of companies that do this is in the hundreds.
How do you think all your phones provide you with WLAN based locations before GPS gets a lock?
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1975
"Location Services allows applications such as Maps, Camera, and Compass to use information from cellular, Wi-Fi1, and Global Positioning System (GPS)2 networks to determine your approximate location. This information is collected anonymously and in a form that does not personally identify you.
About location precision or accuracy
Depending on your device and available services, Location Services uses a combination of cellular, Wi-Fi, and GPS to determine your location. If you're not within a clear line of sight to GPS satellites, iPhone 3G and iPhone 3GS can determine your location using Wi-Fi3. If you're not in range of any Wi-Fi, iPhone can determine your location using cellular towers."
Do you know how they figure out your relative location via Wi-Fi? Yep...they've already got a map of transmitters in the wild to refer to, just like the map Google is building.
My
I was REALLY surprised to find out that Google was doing roads all over Prince Edward Island. Basically they'll drive down anything that isn't dirt, so our house out in the middle of nowhere is on street view. There's even a little white ball of pixels that's actually the dog.
I'd be curious to know if they managed to index our wi-fi though. I can't get a signal in the same room but for some reason I can go stand 300 feet away at the mailbox and use my iPod to check Heavens Above for satellite traffic.
And http://skyhookwireless.com/howitworks/submit_ap.php
My
I find it interesting that when people post information on how they wardrive in their neighborhood and collect this same kind of information they receive all kinds of positive replies about how interesting their setup is and generally a lot of praise for their work, but when a large corporation does the same thing people start talking about how bad it is for this information to be collected. Now I understand that there is a vast difference in the scale of the operation but does that really make a difference? If it does then where do we draw the line?
I live on a very very very remote street where they fore sure have not been driving through - I can't imagine it. And yes, the street is not yet in streetview (I know, this doesn't mean anything)...
So if your WIFI is protected what MAC address can they get? Not the connecting machines? But just your Router or what ? Even that if its locked down can they get your routers MAC? I mean they cannot get your personal machines info so who cares? It's not like they tried to connect to every personal computer as they drove buy.
MAC addresses can still be obtained from an AP that has its SSID restricted from broadcast. There are many tools publicly available that do exactly that.
Now, I didn't see it mentioned anywhere whether that's actively being done so it may be a non-issue, but just wanted to clarify that it's super easy to do.
Enjoy: http://outflux.net/geoloc/
"But the larger point here is that Schmidt isn't even addressing the issue at hand. Per usual. When the privacy question appears, Google likes to talk about the people asking the questions. But the problem lies elsewhere: with the millions upon millions blissfully unaware of the question(s)."
Google is trying to help people figure out the question to the ultimate answer 42!
My abilities are only limited by my imagination
this is the precise reason i change my mac address. I regularly change it to some random number using TMAC (http://www.technitium.com/tmac/index.html)
"scanning private WLAN networks, and recording users' unique MAC (Media Access Control) addresses, as the car trundles along"
there is no shortage of war drivers on Slashdot. timothy, you trying to put the guilt on somebody?
Having to work for a living is the root of all evil.
We need programmers to write code into the drivers to optionally enable the randomization of MAC addresses on wifi cards. This needs to be setup also on the Access Points. maybe setting it up so they change once a day?
Imagine a city like Bakersfield, California where the Sheriff's department flys over neighborhoods with helecopters at maybe 250 feet pointing search lights at the homes. Might they be collecting MAC addresses? might they be sending RFID pulses to identify all the junk in your house?
Considering that department stores like Kohls have experimented with putting RFID chips in clothing, we need to start finding ways to identify where these chips are in our belongings and blast them with microwaves to "blow them out".
Bakersfield, California is home to a ton of corruption in the courts, sheriff's department, District Attorney's office.
I am involved with affidavits against high ranking officers there and sheriff's deputies have made threats against my life.
Seriously, everything from The Register is -1 Flamebait.
This article consists of:
(a) quoting some guy in Germany who is outraged about something Google is doing, but apparently without any legal or technical basis
(b) misquoting Eric Schmidt
(c) pointing out that Der Spiegel has called Google a "data octopus"
Allegations of being a "data octopus"? This is news?
"shouldn't worry about privacy unless you got something to hide?"
why dont everyone just live outside? you know shower out in the open with no walls. have people steal your stuff. how dumb are people these days?
i realize its a different situation then that but that was just a dumb comment.
Correct. Actually, the only way the iPad can find your location is via IP sourcing or using this method. In fact, companies like Fon could possibly rent their wi-fi hotspot database as a lucrative second business.
To do list for Windows
Too bad the point has been MOOT for years!!! WiGLE.net has been mapping AP's for ever, and even has an offline app and map data you can download in advance of your anticipated trek into unfamiliar territory. Google just knows a good idea when it links one!!
I couldn't care less about "SSID privacy", I want to hop on google maps and find my ssid *now*!! When are they going to release it!!
They drive as speedily down the street as they can while cracking WEP keys at a 95% success ratio.
Only Mr. Norris has already pwned the WPA2-PSK you haven't even come up with yet..
You are about to reset your AP's password...
Well, remember that Google's opt-out feature lets users protect privacy by moving to a remote village:
ahref=http://www.theonion.com/video/google-opt-out-feature-lets-users-protect-privacy,14358/rel=url2html-29083http://www.theonion.com/video/google-opt-out-feature-lets-users-protect-privacy,14358/>
Seriously though, welcome to the future. It rang a bell for me when I learned a former member of some defense or intelligence comunity is part of the board of directors.
Lets face it, Google's been compromising their "do no evil" mantra ever since they went public. Financial interests have just outweighed the ethical considerations that originally endeared most of us to the company. But lets face it, their method of profit is quite questionable if you believe that privacy and anonymity are the right of all internet users.
We need a search engine more like Wikipedia. Run by a non-profit organization with open-source code that prioritizes relevancy rather those who have bought the top search results. A search engine that doesn't index anything that's not relevant to search (i.e. they're not trying to discover the best way to advertise to their users). Of course if such a site were to exist it would require some hefty resources, but this could be covered with minimal advertising that correlates to the searched terms. The big difference would be that it wouldn't data mine, as a non-profit organization there would be no motivation to data mine, and as open-source users would be aware of specifically how it works.
I don't think Google is blatantly evil but it's become a bit too big for comfort. I certainly don't like how the only competitive rival is MS (Bing, Yahoo), it's like the internet is being divided into Macs and PCs. The open source community has been so in love with Google this past decade that they've left themselves out. But we need an open search engine for the internet before we become totally dependent on these two big players. Google has a damn good algorithm, but I find it hard to believe that an open algorithm that could be modified by anyone wouldn't become much better. I love a lot of the stuff Google does, especially under Dr. Larry Brilliant, but there needs to be more players in the search game. And one of those players needs to be motivated by something other than money and doesn't answer to a board of directors.
"From the depths of my skeptical and rationalist soul, I ask the Lord to protect me from California touchie-feeliedom."
Hello there, anyone who can hear me! My name is Linksys! You can tell me apart from other folks with the same name because I'm XX:YY:ZZ:AA:BB:CC! If you like, I can give you an IPv4 address! No, no, I haven't been told to exclude anyone who doesn't know my favorite word or phrase! Please talk to me! I love you!
I see the problem, thus the answer is stickers on your car, forehead and/or broadcasting X-No-Archive-Google-Inc: yes
delete this one too fags...
-.haNk