Germany Demands Google Forfeit Citizens' Wi-Fi Data

eldavojohn writes "Germany has ordered Google to give up hard disk drives used to store German data collected during their Street View operations in that country. This follows Google's admission last week (after prodding from the Germans) that it had collected the data from unsecured wireless area networks from around the entire world as its roving cars collected the photo archive for Street View. Google says they've offered to just destroy the data, in cooperation with national regulators, but the German government wants to know what they've collected. They do not think that destroying the drives suffices for compliance with the laws. Officials went so far as to say of the situation, 'It is not acceptable that a company operating in the EU does not respect EU rules.' Germany has certainly been keeping their eye on the search giant." The Ars coverage notes that the US FTC may be looking more closely at Google's collection as well.

Comments

Privacy laws

[sopssa]

I seriously hope more EU countries will demand the same thing. It's outrageous
how Google blatantly breaks laws, especially privacy ones, and get nothing for it.

Whoever in the EU parliament will impose big fines for Google breaking privacy laws gets my vote. It seems it's the only way Google will learn. They have previously too pissed of Germany on privacy issues.

US may not do the same, but Europeans take privacy seriously. We have had our governments to completely different agendas many times in the history. It also doesn't help one thing that Google is an US company and US government can get access to all of our data even while those people aren't US citizens. Don't use Google services you say? That's a little bit hard when they have their cars driving around sniffing web traffic.

Viviane Reding, the European justice commissioner, criticized Google for not cooperating with German privacy officials.

"It is not acceptable that a company operating in the E.U. does not respect E.U. rules," she said in a statement released by her office.

This is what Google should learn.

Re:Privacy laws

[AltairDusk]

Hate to say it but if you have an unsecured wireless network you are freely broadcasting your data over the airwaves for anyone to listen. Laws are not the solution to this, proper security is. I can't walk out on my porch and yell sensitive information then fine you for having heard it.

Re:Privacy laws

[Monty845]

You want the data turned over to the government? That is the absolute last thing I would want if google inappropriately collected my wifi activity. The government should supervise the destruction, not be given the data set to do with as they please...

Re:Privacy laws

[WrongSizeGlass]

It's against the law in Germany to have unsecured wireless networks. Since Google has already collected all this information for the German government they simply want to start handing out fines based on it. "Google, helping any way we can (TM)"

Re:Privacy laws

[gstoddart]

I seriously hope more EU countries will demand the same thing. It's outrageous

Actually, I kind of agree with Google's position about destroying it.

I mean, it boils down to "you have collected something which is illegal and invasive to have ... why don't you give it to us and we'll, er, keep it safe."

I agree that if Google is actually scraping people's email and stuff from unsecured wireless that's a huge invasion of privacy and is a very bad thing. But, handing the same information over to a government who wouldn't be allowed to have it either doesn't seem any better.

Re:Privacy laws

[nmb3000]

US may not do the same, but Europeans take privacy seriously.

If you stand on a street corner and yell back and forth at your neighbor across the street, is somebody standing 100 feet away from you with a tape recorder capturing your conversation violating your privacy?

That's exactly what Google was doing with their wireless capture. I can't say I really like it, but at the same time I also can't say they were violating privacy. If I want to have a private conversation I stop yelling or start using encryption.

Re:Privacy laws

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm glad that Google got caught, and will hopefully be prevented from doing it again in the future, but I'd rather the drives were just destroyed than have them turned over to the government.

Re:Privacy laws

[TooMuchToDo]

Agreed. I trust Google a lot more to do the right thing and destroy the data than the German government. Who's track record is better?

Re:Privacy laws

[Itninja]

But they can fine you for recording and distributing it (which is what Google is doing). Like a radio scanner that can pick up cell phone calls. Sure you listen, but you can never (legally) disseminate the information; even if you hear someone planning a murder.

Re:Privacy laws

[Anonymous Coward]

i dunno, remember when google killed all those jews? oh wait...

Re:Privacy laws

[AltairDusk]

It's against the law in Germany to have unsecured wireless networks. Since Google has already collected all this information for the German government they simply want to start handing out fines based on it. "Google, helping any way we can (TM)"

It is not against the law to have an unsecured wireless network there so far as I know. You can however be fined if someone else uses your unsecured wireless to download copyrighted materials.

From the above:

A recent German court ruling states that if someone downloads illegal movies, music, or other media using an unprotected WiFi connection, the owner of the WiFi source could be fined up to 100 Euros (about $126)

Re:Privacy laws

[sopssa]

There's nothing wrong with laws also giving fines for misusing the unsecured connections and sniffing the traffic in it.

And as it is, it's currently unlawful. You can say that proper security is needed (it is), but the fact is that Google broke laws.

Your home connection to your ISP is also mostly unsecured. Would it be ok for me to tap into that? After all, you weren't using encrypted VPN or encrypted connection to your ISP, so it's only your own fault, right? I didn't think so.

Re:Privacy laws

[91degrees]

It's not exactly what Google were doing. You need at least some equipment to even "hear" what the people are saying. Most people, if aware that the communication is taking place, would have the decency not to listen. I'll grant you it's a public place, but it's closer to recording a conversation between two people. If I put a microphone under a restaurant table I think most people would consider that invading their privacy.

Re:Privacy laws

[sopssa]

Germany as it is after WWII isn't exactly the same Germany it was before it. Allies set up the new government, laws and everything else. In fact, I think it taught a lot of Germans and other Europeans the need for privacy.

Besides, Hitler was really from Austria, not Germany.

Re:Privacy laws

[chaboud]

There's a massive difference between wired communication and wireless. If you honestly can't see that (which I truly doubt is the case), you could be in the parliament of an EU member state!

Seriously, security is the answer to security. Making it illegal to detect and record open-air RF is like making it illegal to see things.

Re:Privacy laws

[joelsanda]

I seriously hope more EU countries will demand the same thing.

Couldn't that mean more copies of that data floating around? I think the best solution is to keep what they have sequestrated and secured (whatever the hell that means these days) so it's at least in one place, assuming that's the state of the data now. If that's the case and I knew I had data like that collected by Google, I'd want the single source destroyed with appropriate folks watching. If nothing else we'll see some geeks dressed up watching a few servers go up in flames, or get to watch CNN broadcast a terminal window processing rm -r yourdir.

Re:Privacy laws

[interkin3tic]

I can't walk out on my porch and yell sensitive information then fine you for having heard it.

Only because you're not the government.

Re:Privacy laws

[Anonymous Coward]

So how come that parent isnt modded 'Troll' or 'Flamebait' ? All Google ever did was take photographs of people in *public* places *and* made sure that the faces were unrecognizable too, so what's the problem ?

Re:Privacy laws

[Anonymous Coward]

It's so true that entities operating inside the EU should abide by EU rules. Like how Germany kept its deficit below 3%... Oh wait it didn't and now Greece has followed suit with disastrous results. Why is it again that Germany has such a problem with streetview in the first place? Oh yeah its because they're frightened that hooligans (i.e. Turks) will come and rob their houses after seeing them on the internet. Score 1 for privacy.

Re:Privacy laws

[Anonymous Coward]

Making it illegal to detect and record open-air RF is like making it illegal to see things..

Only if you have naturally developed wi-fi receiving capability. I'd consider a laser microphone to be breaching my privacy, and possibly infra-red cameras and binoculars in certain circumstances.

Re:Privacy laws

[Aqualung812]

and distributing it (which is what Google is doing)

Show me where they're distributing it. From everything I've heard, Google is the one that said "Oops, we got this stuff by mistake & are going to delete it as soon as we let everyone know". Go read the man pages for Kismet, sounds like that's what they were using & didn't turn off the data collection option.

Re:Privacy laws

[sopssa]

You want the data turned over to the government? That is the absolute last thing I would want if google inappropriately collected my wifi activity. The government should supervise the destruction, not be given the data set to do with as they please...

If you'd actually read the article you would notice that they only wanted one hard drive to see what kind of data Google had collected and if they were breaking laws, and if they should be fined for it and told to stop doing so.

You know, police usually needs evidence so it can actually investigate and come to conclusion. Google refusing and destroying evidence is breaking even more laws and doesn't really show that Google is acting lawfully.

Re:Privacy laws

[Dare nMc]

not sure where you got the distributing it; the only distribution is to the German Government, and only if forced to do so legally. Clearly Google just wants the MAC addresses to have as a GPS backup in the future, the data would have little interest to them, and wasn't intentionally recorded (according to Google, which is believable.)

Re:Privacy laws

[Aqualung812]

And as it is, it's currently unlawful.

What Google did to the data is exactly the same thing you have done if you've ever recorded video or audio in a public place. You have data (sound and images) of people in public. If these people had unsecured wireless, they were sending their data into the street for the world to hear.

Re:Privacy laws

[DangerFace]

But they can fine you for recording and distributing it (which is what Google is doing)

Wait, what? Where can I get this information? Where is it being distributed? IIRC, they just used some old bit of wireless network scanning software and happened to pick up more than they meant to. I don't exactly like Google having all my personal information, but thinking that Google gives some kind of massive shit about a few people's unsecured information is is definitely in the tinfoil hat zone.

If I had to, what I would class this as is the same as if you were walking down the street with a digital recorder, coming up with ideas for some sort of article you were writing about the area. While walking along talking into this digital recorder, creating files that will be sanitized and refactored before ever seeing the light of day, someone shouts some personal information. Then the German government gets all pissy about it and demands you hand over the tapes, and the FTC start an investigation.

Seriously guys, there are problems with Google. There are. This is not one of them, though.

Like a radio scanner that can pick up cell phone calls. Sure you listen, but you can never (legally) disseminate the information; even if you hear someone planning a murder.

So this implies that listening is ok? since that's all Google is doing, I fail to see the problem.

Re:Privacy laws

[cgenman]

Good luck "supervising destruction" in a modern sense. Other than attempting to verify that the data has been deleted, what are you going to do? If this is stored anywhere in Google's cloud, chances are they'd have to copy it to a hard drive first, before being able to hand it all over. Then what, destroy that hard drive?

Re:Privacy laws

[interkin3tic]

I seriously hope more EU countries will demand the same thing. It's outrageous
how Google blatantly breaks laws, especially privacy ones, and get nothing for it.

Blatantly? Others more knowledgeable than me have suggested that this was an honest mistake. Furthermore, this may be reading too much into the summary's language, but this part sounds fishy

the German government wants to know what they've collected. They do not think that destroying the drives suffices for compliance with the laws.

Are we to understand that the german government has made laws and isn't exactly sure on what's legal and not legal according to those laws? Because if they don't know, how the hell would Google know how to abide by those laws.

Furthermore, why are you upset with google rather than the hypocrites in office who are clearly using this to bypass their own privacy laws? This is a bit like a cop busting a drug dealer and taking and selling the drugs himself, and you're mad at the drug dealer.

Re:Privacy laws

[Anonymous Coward]

Are you for real? Germany have been a beacon of democracy in Europe since World War II ended, a driving force in the European Community and have actually outlawed the movement you refer to, which started almost 78 years ago and was crushed to death 13 years later. 13 is, incidentally, just how long Google have been in business. You should be modded down as an ignorant troll, not given virtual pats on the back from other ignorant trolls.

Besides, Google's track record is infinitely worse than the German government's during Google's short lifespan.

P.S.: it's "whose", not "who's".

Re:Privacy laws

[bradley13]

I have to agree. While it's great that the European countries take privacy seriously, there is a real problem here. If someone transmits radio waves into public space - heck, into your house, your car and through your body - just how can any sensible person say you do not have a right to receive those radio waves? This is especially ridiculous outcomes in the case of wireless networks, since practically every European citizen carries a wireless receiver (in their mobile phone) all the time. There can be no expectation of privacy here.

As a related anecdote, Google has gotten in trouble in Switzerland because their camera is mounted higher than a person's normal eye level. This is a much more valid complaint, as it means that the camera occasionally sees over hedges and fences and into windows that people did reasonably consider to be out of the public view.

Re:Privacy laws

[Anonymous Coward]

That "some eqipment" is more generally available than the microphone in your analogy.
And Google had the decency to not listen. In your analogy - again - they just forgot the mic on.

This entire affair has blown into ridiculous proportions.

Re:Privacy laws

[Galestar]

How wrong you are. Open Wi-Fi is like an open window in your house - just because you leave the window open doesn't mean its okay for anybody to climb in and "have a look around".

Most people know that its generally a bad idea to have unsecured Wi-Fi, just as its a bad idea to leave your windows open in a bad neighborhood. One person's stupidity doesn't give another the right to take advantage.

Re:Privacy laws

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

Who's track record is better?

In recent years? EU governments (or Germany in particular) vs. US corporations (or Google in particular)? Seriously?

Europeans have learned some hard lessons from history, some of them still within living memory. One of them is a healthy distrust of government; you may have noticed that we have removed several formerly powerful administrations from office in recent years. But another is that the US does not hold its businesses to account very effectively. Thus, we tend to take a rather stricter line with big business in many respects, privacy and data protection among them.

As long as it is the privacy/data protection authorities who are arranging the destruction of the data (and potentially bringing legal action against Google), and not any other branch of government who have no more legitimate right to access that data than Google, I would far rather the drives were removed from Google's hands.

Re:Privacy laws

[SanityInAnarchy]

If police came knocking on my door and said I'm under investigation for downloading child porn, you think it would be ok for me to say "don't worry, it was a mistake and I'm going to be deleting it soon" and they wouldn't want my computer and hard drives to investigate it?

Sure, they'd want it. But I also don't think it should be a crime to possess child porn, and the attempt to censor it has a corrosive effect on freedom of speech and net neutrality.

Re:Privacy laws

[Aqualung812]

If police came knocking on my door and said I'm under investigation for downloading child porn

Again, that isn't what occurred. This would be like you walking into the police station saying "Hey, an automated script on my computer downloaded child porn, when I meant to download anime. Going to go delete it now."

Besides, German police didn't want all of their data. They wanted one hard drive

You clearly have no understanding how RAID, SANs, or databases work. One hard drive will have nothing readable on it.

Re:Privacy laws

[dbet]

And yet, if I drive through your neighborhood and write down the time of day everyone leaves and gets home, how many kids they have, you can bet I'd be getting a visit from the police.

On a side note, for a long time cordless phones were completely unsecured, and anyone with a scanner could listen to conversations. The law was very clear - you could listen but never discuss what was being said.

Would a similar law for wireless traffic work? I don't think seeing a wireless network or even using it should be a crime, but recording IP addresses, tracking what ports are open, how many computers are connected, and most importantly, keeping a database of it, could be illegal.

Re:Privacy laws

[Josef Meixner]

I mean, it boils down to "you have collected something which is illegal and invasive to have ... why don't you give it to us and we'll, er, keep it safe."

No, it boils down to "you have told us you take photos from public places of houses, then you have to admit, that you also collect MAC-addresses and SSIDs (which you 'forgot' to mention when we talked about it) and then just two weeks later you tell us, 'whoops, we also collected some mails and some web sessions, sorry' and now we want to see, what you have collected, as we don't see any more reason to trust you".

And in case you wonder, it is possible that Google broke the privacy laws, which in Germany also apply to unencrypted communication and might be liable. Courts here have ruled, that the Apache logfile also violates privacy, as it is not legal to gather privacy related data on people without their consent and without a specific reason justified by legal provisions or necessary to do your business. You also have to delete the data when it is no longer needed.

In any case, should Google actually have broken the law, then the charge for it would 2 to 5 years, but it is not entirely clear, if the law applies, because you have to prove intent and who knows how long this could drag on.

Re:Privacy laws

[Schadrach]

Ah, so you're saying that if you broadcast something unencrypted into the general vicinity, it's illegal to perceive it unless you can do so without the aid of any kind of equipment external to your body itself? Damn it, that means you could paint a mural of sensitive information on your driveway and since I'm severely nearsighted, if I look at it (with my glasses on so I could potentially read it) I've broken the law?

Re:Privacy laws

[Schadrach]

Crud, meant to keep going on that.

Next thing you know, you'll tell me that over-the-air broadcast television stations and radio stations can, at will, ban someone from listening and if they ever tune that station again they can be fined?

Re:Privacy laws

[zazzel]

How can this be modded "interesting"?

I seriously hope more EU countries will demand the same thing. It's outrageous
how Google blatantly breaks laws, especially privacy ones, and get nothing for it.

Google does not break laws, they are doing this legally, (at worst) in an unregulated area - collecting publicly available data on an industry scale.

Whoever in the EU parliament will impose big fines for Google breaking privacy laws gets my vote.

I do not want EU legislation on this, thank you. There is still the rule of subsidiarity, so this is a national question anyways.

Don't use Google services you say? That's a little bit hard when they have their cars driving around sniffing web traffic.

Wow. Google is NOT sniffing web traffic, they are at best wardriving (but not accessing WLANs), maybe recording encryption schemes on found WLANs. So? Any telco/ISP-provided router is configured for WPA/WPA2 anyways.

Viviane Reding, the European justice commissioner,

Viviane Reding is, first of all, a typical EU politician. She has a history of interfering in national jurisdiction (ignoring the principle of subsidiarity to justify her existence), free markets,on whatever she "feels" is wrong. Sometimes she has a reason (as with absurd roaming charges), sometimes she should better stick to the principle that quite often, no law is the best law.

Re:Privacy laws

[Anonymous Coward]

>Allies set up the new government, laws and everything else.

Bull. Shit.

Re:Privacy laws

[mr_death]

You've got to be kidding me -- Google collected "private" data that was being _broadcast_ by people's Wireless Access Points, and it's Google's fault? Any idiot within ~100m or so could do the same thing.

If Europeans really "take privacy seriously", they would configure their equipment correctly.

Re:Privacy laws

[gstoddart]

No, it boils down to "you have told us you take photos from public places of houses, then you have to admit, that you also collect MAC-addresses and SSIDs (which you 'forgot' to mention when we talked about it) and then just two weeks later you tell us, 'whoops, we also collected some mails and some web sessions, sorry' and now we want to see, what you have collected, as we don't see any more reason to trust you".

Oh, I'm not disputing that Google keeps admitting to having harvested way more than they ought to have. I just don't see how giving the information to the government makes things better.

And in case you wonder, it is possible that Google broke the privacy laws

Again, I suspect they did break the privacy laws, and there should be some form of penalty. But, if they hand it over to the government, what's to stop them from doing a little surreptitious investigating of the data as well?? Two wrongs don't make a right.

I don't actually know what the remedy should be here, but showing that data to even more people isn't in keeping with the privacy laws either.

And, if any of that data should end up on US soil, the US laws on their access to data collected by US companies would mean the US government could subpoena this and force Google to not tell anyone.

Re:Privacy laws

[Anonymous Coward]

One person's stupidity doesn't give another the right to take advantage.

But your stupidity makes my fucking eyes bleed. Google did not "climb in" - they captured packets that were ALREADY PASSING THROUGH THE AIR. To follow your analogy, this is like playing your stereo in front of the open window and then bitching that other people can hear the music from outside without your permission.

Re:Privacy laws

[thetoadwarrior]

I'm not entirely happy that they collect the data however I don't know if I want it be a case where I can get in trouble for collecting something that is freely available and in fact my hardware (router, laptop, phone, etc) are built to find. Where do you draw the line on when you're collecting data and breaking someone's privacy.

Also if your privacy extends onto public streets do I get in trouble for taking pictures in front of people's houses or when someone happens to be walking in front of my camera?

If anything the call should instead be for modems and routers to default to the most secure settings and warnings telling people that when they change the settings they are opening themselves up to privacy and security concerns. This would stop Google or anyone (as I'm certain Google isn't the only one) from cataloguing the data but much more importantly it will stop people from doing something far worse with people's internet connections and quite frankly I'm less concerned about Google knowing my wifi exists and more concerned about someone breaking in and using it to pirate or worse yet download illegal images.

Re:Privacy laws

[Anonymous Coward]

You clearly have no understanding how RAID, SANs, or databases work. One hard drive will have nothing readable on it.

However, police officers do. Don't you see, it part of Google's evil plan to make the germans look stupid.

Re:Privacy laws

[Tom]

While I agree on being careful with the government, I find this american trait of total distrust in the government paired with way too much trust in private companies very much irrational. As do most europeans. We watch our governments, and we usually don't like them very much, but we don't think they were put there by the devil himself and are evil incarnate.

Re:Privacy laws

[Anonymous Coward]

I think accepting some hard drives would be largely symbolic. If the German government doesn't trust Google to properly destroy the data, why should it trust Google to hand over all copies? What's that government going to do, seize all the infrastructure and physical assets pending a complete audit?

Re:Privacy laws

[maxwell demon]

All you know is that the cop wants a little bit of the drug. Anything else is your induction. If he wanted to sell it himself, why would he settle with a small probe, instead of demanding all of it? Most likely he wants it to be analyzed, so he can tell what exactly the drug dealer was actually selling.

Re:Privacy laws

[daff2k]

In Germany and many other countries in the EU it is specifically forbidden to intentionally connect to a wireless network of which you are not the proprietor or have access rights to, let alone record its traffic. It doesn't matter if the network is unsecured or not. It is simply not allowed. Nothing magical about it.

Re:Privacy laws

[Anonymous Coward]

Your post seems to contradict itself, to be specific I can't see how "outlawed the movement you refer to" and "beacon of democracy" can be reconciled. "You can vote for whoever you want, as long as it isn't one of the parties we disagree with" is a pretty undemocratic standard.

The fact that they had to outlaw the movement also suggests that it isn't nearly as "crushed to death" as you'd like us to think. You don't need to outlaw things that are dead.

Re:Privacy laws

[Josef Meixner]

Oh, I'm not disputing that Google keeps admitting to having harvested way more than they ought to have. I just don't see how giving the information to the government makes things better.

Easy, how can we be sure, that Google captured the data accidentally? How can we be sure, that they really only captures some fragments which are basically noise. They lied to the German government twice now. And had to admit to having collected way more data than previously admitted. Don't forget, they have been doing that for 3 years now and only now, that the German government actually started to take a look at what is happening we get the information, what has been going on. And not being from the US I actually trust my government more than a company which has a "strained" relationship with privacy.

I don't actually know what the remedy should be here, but showing that data to even more people isn't in keeping with the privacy laws either.

Actually it is, as the person asking for it has exactly the job of making sure, that companies respect the privacy laws. Their power is very limited (just look at the puny fee he can hand out).

And, if any of that data should end up on US soil, the US laws on their access to data collected by US companies would mean the US government could subpoena this and force Google to not tell anyone.

Actually the four hard discs containing the data seem to be in or near San Francisco (I guess, that they are actually in Mountain View). From the NYT article linked:

In a blog posting late Monday, Alan Eustace, a Google senior vice president for engineering and research, wrote that a San Francisco company, Isec Partners, had overseen destruction of the Irish data.

In his blog Mr. Eustace included a link to a report from Alex Stamos, the Isec Partners employee who witnessed destruction of the Irish data from the larger batch of WLAN data improperly collected around the world.

In his letter to Google, Mr. Stamos described the WLAN data in question as being contained on four hard drives, organized by individual country. Mr. Stamos said he created volumes on two new encrypted hard drives and copied over all of the data except for Ireland. The original four hard drives were then destroyed, Mr. Stamos wrote.

Re:Privacy laws

[stagg]

I understand that I need to properly secure my wireless network if I want security/privacy. I understand what kind of encryption is best, how to set up a proper firewall, proxy, and what to tell Facebook and what not to. My mother does not. It doesn't matter if all of Slashdot knows how to protect their data, the same can not be said for the world. "Oh sorry, we thought you KNEW that our satellites could read your thoughts. Every techie I know is already wearing a tin foil hat, why aren't you? Sheesh, what an idiot."

Re:Privacy laws

[thetoadwarrior]

Yet you can buy all of those things. But more importantly most devices that connect to wifi are purposely built to find wifi points. Should that be illegal if so most phones, laptops, routers, etc are in violation of your neighbour's privacy.

Sometimes those devices will simply connect to the point they feel is the best option and it may not be your own especially if yours is locked and your neighbour's point is not. You technically used their connection though.

The pressure needs to be put on modems/routers/etc to be not broadcast by default and simply have all their settings set with maximum privacy and security in mind rather than punishing people for seeing public data.

Re:Privacy laws

[Sancho]

The below is my understanding of the law in Texas, and does not constitute legal advice.

In Texas, it's actually illegal to record a conversation unless at least one of the parties of the conversation knows that they are being recorded. It doesn't matter if the recording is over a wire or in person.

It is legal, however, to record images of a person in public except under different circumstances generally involving recordings of crotches and breasts.

So to me, this presents something of an inconsistent legal sphere. Why are public conversations protected, while public actions are not? Given this inconsistent interpretation, I can quite easily see Google's actions being of questionable legality in Texas.

Re:Privacy laws

[Cyberllama]

Google's explanation is that they didn't do any of this on purpose and frankly it's actually a pretty believable explanation when you read the details. They intentionally sniff out Wifi access points for Geolocation on devices with no GPS (like Skyhook). Unfortunately they apparently recycled some code written for a 20% project by another employee. What they wanted was MAC addresses they could correlate them to physical locations -- what they actaully saved instead was the entire packet which also contained payload data. Understand, however, that you could learn next to nothing from 1 - 2 seconds worth of random packets from a given network (which is about all you get if you're driving through the networks). There's absolutely no reason to believe they would have intentionally collected this data because it has no obvious value to them and they've got a perfectly reasonable explanation for how it occurred accidentally.

What will punishing them beyond the negative publicity they've already gotten really accomplish here? They were truthful and honest about their mistake and did the right thing when they realized it. Honestly, the only lesson you could hope to teach Google here is that "not being evil" doesn't pay off because you're going to get screwed either way in the end.

Re:Privacy laws

[gstoddart]

And not being from the US I actually trust my government more than a company which has a "strained" relationship with privacy.

I leave it for you to judge your own government, sir. I don't trust my, or most anyone else's government, to play by the rules. I just presume they're all turds.

Actually it is, as the person asking for it has exactly the job of making sure, that companies respect the privacy laws. Their power is very limited (just look at the puny fee he can hand out).

So, it's a law with no real teeth then? At which point, companies probably have more incentive to break it and pay the "puny fee" than actually worry about it.

Actually the four hard discs containing the data seem to be in or near San Francisco (I guess, that they are actually in Mountain View).

In which case, if the US wanted to, they could force Google to make copies before the HDs are destroyed or given to Germany -- at which point, they've exported the data into US jurisdiction, and you have literally no recourse as I understand it. Now, it's possible they'll refrain from this, but you'd never know if they did.

Cheers

Re:Privacy laws

[Sancho]

Receive? Yes. Record? Not necessarily.

Re:Privacy laws

[fustakrakich]

On the contrary.. Google is very protective of privacy. Look how well they are protecting China's state secrets.

While this is a nice idea, the data has probably been tampered with by now and will be useless to the authorities

Re:Privacy laws

[guruevi]

Wrong analogy. Open WiFi is like opening your windows and then walking naked in front of it (or do anything else that you want to keep private) and then be mad at somebody else when they see you.

Re:Privacy laws

[Anonymous Coward]

I think it taught a lot of Germans and other Europeans the need for privacy.

That, and three decades of the Stasi have made the Germans rightly protective of their privacy.

Re:Privacy laws

[nephosis]

The Google haters on /. really amaze me with how they single out one company for all this hatred. In my opinion, Google is easily the most trustworthy company in a position to receive so much information.

Take for example the story that everyone should already know: Yahoo helps communist China imprison democracy seekers.

Meanwhile we all know Google's stance against Chinese oppression, but don't forget they even resist US government.

So I am more inclined to think positively of Google, in light of how much more evil everyone else is.
And some of you are angry for Google not wanting to hand over information to the German government?
How anyone could prefer that is just strange to me.

Re:Privacy laws

[A nonymous Coward]

making it illegal to see things.

Is that you, Tom?

Re:Privacy laws

[Bengie]

The only difference is that cell phones are encrypted. Maybe if Google and breaking encryption and listening in on network's, then your analogy would work.

Re:Privacy laws

[thetoadwarrior]

If Google didn't share the data then that is the same as hearing a phone conversation and not discussing it and would it not be the same to say I can use your open connection but can't share the data I download?

I agree it's not great they did log it even if it's not shared but I'd much rather see the responsibility lie with the wifi modem and router manufacturers as my concern is more with people who have more evil uses for wifi connections than Google or any other company. I like privacy but I don't want people thinking they can then infringe on my rights in a public area just because they're too stupid to keep their business private.

Re:Privacy laws

[Bengie]

My ISP uses 128bit AES with rolling keys on our cable modems along with many other large ISP like Time Warner. Been standard since DOCSIS2.0.

Your ISP must suck.

Re:Privacy laws

[atticus9]

Regulation comes at the cost of innovation and growth. I agree companies should be held accountable for their actions, as well as individuals and governments. But it's easy to get carried away, punishing the potential of someone doing something wrong, without giving people a chance, can be pretty stifling.

As far as EU governments go, with governments like Greece which misled the world on deficits and nearly triggered another financial collapse, not to mention an estimated 8% of their GDP going to corruption. No I don't think they qualify as a gold standard for trust, but they do regulate their businesses severely. Apparently it takes 15 steps in order to start a company in Greece, with up to months inbetween each one, all in the name of keeping corporations "safe."

Re:Privacy laws

[sopssa]

And as it is, it's currently unlawful.

What Google did to the data is exactly the same thing you have done if you've ever recorded video or audio in a public place. You have data (sound and images) of people in public. If these people had unsecured wireless, they were sending their data into the street for the world to hear.

Where are you from? Because many EU countries actually have laws regarding recording video and audio of people even in public places. You cannot just say "but it was a public place", there are restrictions to it. For example you cannot film or take and publish pictures of a person without consent (unless public figure/celebrity), at least so that he or she is identifiable from those.

For example in Sweden stores that contain security cameras *must clearly note so* outside the store. By law you are required to tell people if you are recording them.

In many EU countries there is also expectation of certain privacy even in public places.

Re:Privacy laws

[beerbear]

Because actions speak louder than... wait, what?

Re:Privacy laws

[pclminion]

How wrong you are. Open Wi-Fi is like an open window in your house - just because you leave the window open doesn't mean its okay for anybody to climb in and "have a look around".

Nobody climbed into the house. They looked through the wide open window while standing in the street. Don't like it? Close your window and draw the blinds.

Re:Privacy laws

[Anonymous Coward]

Google should have destroyed the date before they admitted that they got it. They should have known that once the government knew it's there, they would want to scour it for nice little titbits of information about their citizens, especially since they wouldn't have been allowed to gather this precious data themselves.

Re:Privacy laws

[beerbear]

If you are too tolerant of intolerance, you'll not have the freedom to be tolerant at all.
"You can vote for whoever you want, as long as it isn't someone who wants to abolish democracy in general, and human rights for some humans in specific" doesn't sound undemocratic to me.
Seriously, which democratic state allows political parties that commit violent crimes?

Re:Privacy laws

[Anonymous Coward]

If I want to have a private conversation I stop yelling or start using encryption.

But you have to understand that not everyone in the world is a nerd and reads slashdot and has a clue about encryption. Man has talked and yelled for thousands of years, the idea that if you talk loud someone can hear you is in his nature... you just can't compare the concept of talking to wifi broadcast.

Re:Privacy laws

[just_another_sean]

this is like playing your stereo in front of the open window and then bitching that other people can hear the music from outside without your permission.

Don't go getting off topic and bringing the RIAA into us.

Re:Privacy laws

[LordVader717]

No, the better analogy is having your car parked on your driveway, and kicking up a fuss when someone decides to do a survey of car models. If you don't want anybody to find out, you shouldn't park your car in plain view. It's not unreasonable to collect such information as long as it's used responsibly. I.e. they can publish "20% of Dullsville Residents drive a Ford", but saying "Joe Blow at number 39 drives a black 2003 BMW 3-series" is inappropriate.

Re:Privacy laws

[91degrees]

Ah, so you're saying that if you broadcast something unencrypted into the general vicinity, it's illegal to perceive it unless you can do so without the aid of any kind of equipment external to your body itself?

Nope. I'm saying that it's only unambiguously legal if it's reasonable that someone might be able to do so. If you need extra equipment to do so then things need to be considered on a case by case basis.

Next thing you know, you'll tell me that over-the-air broadcast television stations and radio stations can, at will, ban someone from listening and if they ever tune that station again they can be fined?

I believe you can be fined in Germany if you watch broadcast television and don't pay the licence fee. Actually most countries forbid listening on certain frequencies without permission.

Ultimately it comes down to expectations. I expect someone to be able to see a mural on a wall. I don't expect someone to be recording the radio packets that travel between my PC and my router, especially as part of their process of taking photographs of streets.

Re:Privacy laws

[maxwell demon]

So this implies that listening is ok?

In Germany, it isn't. But more importantly, recording isn't OK. Recording is different than listening, and it's sometimes OK to listen but not to record. For example, if someone has sex in a room with the window open, and you can see it from the street without problems (and without any technical aid), AFAIK you can watch as much as you want (at least as far as the law is concerned). However as soon as you use your cam to record it, you're in trouble.

Re:Privacy laws

[Skuld-Chan]

What law did they break by listening in on *open* wi-fi connections?

Re:Privacy laws

[maxwell demon]

Wrong analogy. Open WiFi is like opening your windows and then walking naked in front of it (or do anything else that you want to keep private) and then be mad at somebody else when they see you.

s/see you/photograph you/

Remember, it's not about seeing the data, it's about recording it.

Re:Privacy laws

[Anonymous Coward]

An open window to your house isn't projecting it's contents into the world. It's a passive open access.

An open wifi network in your house is broadcasting it's presence and contents. It's an active open access.

There's no way that broadcasting a signal is the same as leaving your window open. As for privacy laws, I understand why Europe takes them so seriously given it's history of regimes. You want to protect the citizens from government or organizational collection of personal information. A single law isn't how to do this properly. As you can see, the government here is ending up with the data in the end by means of the law ment to protect citizens from unsolicited data collection. Seems like a durpa durp situation to me. Most EU citizens tend to rant on about the importance of privacy, but I've rarely seen the insight about why it's so important. They know it is, but can't explain exactly why. Instead of laws, proper education on how to not publicly broadcast your sensitive information is a better solution. I'm not going to stand on a soap box and shout my social insurance number, and then charge everyone with hearing it. I'm smarter than that and know I must control the access to this information.

Privacy laws, imo, are about giving you the right to control access to your information; Here we see a situation that the law says its illegal to listen even if you're shouting it. In an age where everyone owns digital radios capable of transmission over distance, these laws MUST be re defined. Citizens have the right to control access, not the right to attack someone for collecting information they provided free access too.

Re:Privacy laws

[Anonymous Coward]

And yet, if I drive through your neighborhood and write down the time of day everyone leaves and gets home, how many kids they have, you can bet I'd be getting a visit from the police.

Ironically, that's precisely the information that the US Census wants to collect with their "Community Survey". But, you know, I guess it's OK for the government to do it.

Re:Privacy laws

[misexistentialist]

Germans haven't learned much from history as they are still registering their religion and address with the government and police as well as allowing government censorship. And the German government's use of trojans as investigative tools does not seem very comforting when it comes to data privacy. While privacy laws are certainly tighter, I would still rather have my data with Google than with Siemens, for example. Finally the idea that data can be removed from anyone's hands, Google's or the government's, is rather ridiculous.

Re:Privacy laws

[maxwell demon]

They didn't take a survey of car models. They noted the license plates and made photos of the car's interior.

Re:Privacy laws

[maxwell demon]

An open window to your house isn't projecting it's contents into the world. It's a passive open access.

An open wifi network in your house is broadcasting it's presence and contents. It's an active open access.

What if it's dark outside and the lights are on in the room?

Re:Privacy laws

[DamnStupidElf]

Receive? Yes. Record? Not necessarily.

So running wireshark (which records the packets it captures) in my own home to troubleshoot my own wireless router is illegal because I'll record my neighbor's unencrypted packets too?

Accidental or incidental recording should not be illegal because it's so incredibly easy to do by mistake, and so incredibly easy to prevent on behalf of the affected party with encryption.

Intentionally recording wireless traffic is also necessary for security analysis. If you own an airport and offer free wifi, it's pretty much your responsibility to log and monitor all wireless traffic to detect and shut down rogue access points used for phishing or other fraud. How do you do that without recording?

Re:Privacy laws

[DamnStupidElf]

Remember, it's not about seeing the data, it's about recording it.

What about the poor souls with photographic memory? They obviously violate copyright laws too, but that's another discussion.

Re:Privacy laws

[Anonymous Coward]

connecting == transmitting
listening != connecting

Re:Privacy laws

[commodore64_love]

>>>against the law in Germany to have unsecured wireless networks.

Really? Well then that really calls into question the Government's motives. Are they policing a naughty corporation, or are they seeking to use the data themselves to punish citizens? If I worked at Google I would destroy the drives immediately, rather than turn it over to a government (german, EU, or US). Private data needs to be protected from prying politicians' eyes, per the EU Lisbon Treaty

Re:Privacy laws

[BobMcD]

So to me, this presents something of an inconsistent legal sphere. Why are public conversations protected, while public actions are not? Given this inconsistent interpretation, I can quite easily see Google's actions being of questionable legality in Texas.

Because actions and conversations are, you know, different things.

The laws (are supposed to) reflect the needs and wants of the people. We don't necessarily need/want the power to move about the streets unrecorded, but do reserve the right to have conversations with an expectation of privacy. Otherwise, we'd all wind up retreating to 'privacy zones' in order to discuss anything.

Think for a moment about attorney-client privilege. It doesn't make any sense. Why can't the cops just listen in on and/or record the defense's planning sessions? They'd clearly get right to the truth of what really happened and have a much higher and more accurate conviction rate. Well, they can't have that power because we've reserved it from them so the adversarial system can have a reasonable shot at working as desired. Vis-a-vi conversations in public.

Re:Privacy laws

[gd2shoe]

Clearly Google just wants the MAC addresses to have as a GPS backup in the future...

Do you mean IP addresses? That would at least be believable. What good would a map of MAC addresses be?

... wasn't intentionally recorded (according to Google, which is believable.)

I don't believe that for a second. Perhaps permission wasn't acquired from management and legal council, but that's not the same thing as unintentional.

Re:Privacy laws

[BobMcD]

For example in Sweden stores that contain security cameras *must clearly note so* outside the store. By law you are required to tell people if you are recording them.

In many EU countries there is also expectation of certain privacy even in public places.

Does Sweden have any amusement parks or other public venues? If so, can one bring in a camcorder? If so, how does one go about getting all the notifications signed and legally processed from all the passers-by?

Unless of course these laws are as selectively enforced over there as they are over there, that is...

Re:Privacy laws

[Hognoxious]

It's outrageous how Google blatantly breaks laws, especially privacy ones, and get nothing for it.

I agree. Take the UK law about having privacy when walking down a public street. You can't get much more outrageous than breaking a nonexistent law.

Re:Privacy laws

[AltairDusk]

There's nothing wrong with laws also giving fines for misusing the unsecured connections and sniffing the traffic in it.

And as it is, it's currently unlawful. You can say that proper security is needed (it is), but the fact is that Google broke laws.

Your home connection to your ISP is also mostly unsecured. Would it be ok for me to tap into that? After all, you weren't using encrypted VPN or encrypted connection to your ISP, so it's only your own fault, right? I didn't think so.

If that is the law then there is no arguing Google has broken the law. I disagree with how the law is trying to accomplish the desired result but that doesn't change the facts.

I do not consider you tapping into the wired connection between me and my ISP to be the same situation at all. You either have to trespass on my property or trespass on the utility company's property by climbing the pole to tap into that data. There is a reasonable expectation of privacy there considering the lines are not public property and you would have to break the law to get at the data to begin with.

By contrast the Google car was driving by on a public roadway receiving signals broadcast into public airspace which are not secured. No trespassing on private property was necessary and I do not believe Open WiFi carries any reasonable expectation of privacy when it extends beyond the bounds of your own property. If the general public believes otherwise I think time and effort would be better spent educating the public.

Re:Privacy laws

[Sancho]

Your entire post presupposed that any form of capturing is illegal. That's absurd, and I think you know it.

Re:Privacy laws

[BobMcD]

Besides, Hitler was really from Austria, not Germany.

And what of all the people who supported his rise to power, and followed his orders? All Austrians as well?

Re:Privacy laws

[BobMcD]

While I agree on being careful with the government, I find this american trait of total distrust in the government paired with way too much trust in private companies very much irrational. As do most europeans. We watch our governments, and we usually don't like them very much, but we don't think they were put there by the devil himself and are evil incarnate.

By your description, I can see why you'd be confused. I'll try and elaborate...

See we Americans know that our government is bought-and-paid-for by the corporate elite. These are evil, evil bastards when it comes to manipulating our legal system, and will stop at nothing to screw us over. We're raised to believe we have this excellent system of government, by the people and for the people, and so are continuously getting surprised when these corporations use their cash against our best interests.

Outside of that influence, however, most if not all companies really only care about their stock price or what-have-you. This is so easily predictable that we don't really spend much time fretting about it. 'Greedy bastard' is the status quo, and thusly isn't any big deal.

I suppose the shortest summary is 'the devil you know'.

Re:Privacy laws

[fyrewulff]

Caught? They freely admitted to it. If they hadn't said anything and just quietly deleted it, nobody would have ever known.

Re:Privacy laws

[Hognoxious]

You know, investigation is what law enforcement does when someone has broke the laws.

Wrong. When someone has broke[sic] the law (and been proven to have done so) sentencing is what the judiciary does.

Investigation is, by definition, part of the process of finding out whether they did or did not broke[sic] the law.

Re:Privacy laws

[Sancho]

Because actions and conversations are, you know, different things.

The biggest difference--and I suspect the one which comes into play--is field of observance. In order to record a conversation in public, you usually need to be fairly close to a person or have sophisticated equipment. In order to record a video of a person's actions, you could be fairly far away. Normal recordings of scenery could well capture a large number of people's actions. Video in any public place would effectively be illegal if you couldn't record video.

The laws (are supposed to) reflect the needs and wants of the people. We don't necessarily need/want the power to move about the streets unrecorded, but do reserve the right to have conversations with an expectation of privacy. Otherwise, we'd all wind up retreating to 'privacy zones' in order to discuss anything.

Well, on any given issue, there's going to be a minority who disagree on what ultimately becomes law. That minority may be quite large. Consider the debate on public health care. In fact, without a referendum, it's actually pretty hard to gauge the wants of the people, because politicians are pretty good on focusing on and promoting particular, controversial issues on which they are fairly sure that they can get votes.

I don't think it's clear at all that the laws here reflect the will of the people in this case, since it's not a hot-button issue.

Think for a moment about attorney-client privilege. It doesn't make any sense. Why can't the cops just listen in on and/or record the defense's planning sessions?

However it is perfectly consistent with most of the rest of the laws. Police can't listen to private conversations in general unless they believe a crime is about to be committed and they can convince a judge of that.

Re:Privacy laws

[sopssa]

You can record something as long as you aren't directly recording or photographing a specific person without his consent. That is for personal purposes - something like recording for TV or publicly broadcasting are a different matter.

And yes, they are selectively enforced, accounting common sense and the persons purpose too.

Re:Privacy laws

[Anonymous Coward]

If you stand on a street corner and yell back and forth at your neighbor across the street, is somebody standing 100 feet away from you with a tape recorder capturing your conversation violating your privacy? That's exactly what Google was doing with their wireless capture.

It's not exactly that same thing, since you can't naturally hear wifi conversations.

Can you record a phone call or conversation when you do not have consent from one of the parties?

Regardless of whether state or federal law governs the situation, it is almost always illegal to record a phone call or private conversation to which you are not a party, do not have consent from at least one party, and could not naturally overhear. In addition, federal and many state laws do not permit you to surreptitiously place a bug or recording device on a person or telephone, in a home, office or restaurant to secretly record a conversation between two people who have not consented.

Re:Privacy laws

[Hognoxious]

For example in Sweden stores that contain security cameras *must clearly note so* outside the store. By law you are required to tell people if you are recording them.

I don't know about Sweden, but in the UK shops, bars, railway stations and the like are not public places. They are private property to which the public are admitted.

In many EU countries there is also expectation of certain privacy even in public places.

I can expect a unicorn to stand outside my door and fart rose petals, but it doesn't mean that my expectation has any legal basis.

Re:Privacy laws

[Domo-Sun]

It is illegal to see things, in some situations. E.g., if you trespass or climb up a ladder and look in someone's window, you're invading privacy. This is why people can, and have, sued google for taking photos of their private property.

At least where I live, people have a right to a certain level of, and expectation of privacy in some situations. I'd argue, as most reasonable people would, that it applies to wifi.

Re:Privacy laws

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

Do keep in mind that (assuming TFA is correct) we are only talking about a small sample of the data here to investigate whether Google was breaking the rules. We're not talking about handing over the entire collected data set for some government intelligence agency to go on the biggest fishing expedition in history, nor for the government to supervise the destruction of all affected hard drives for that matter.

Re:Privacy laws

[Anonymous Coward]

Germany is terrible for personal privacy. This really is a remnant from imperial beurocracy and very similar to the excessive census the Nazis used.
You have to walk around with a passport at all times, and can be fined for not doing so. You also have to show it to buy a phone, so they can save your Name and Adress in a huge database. Everybody is required to register where they live, their religion, and a variety of other information finds it's way in there too.
These things may not seem spectacular on their own, but what is worrying is the ruthless exploitaion of the data with no regards to privacy. Basically, the law says that anybody with a legitimate interest can request the information. Usually this isn't even checked as it would be "too time-consuming". They may even decide it's too time-consuming to "seperate" the data, so a enquirer will often get much more information than they bargained for.
Even the TV license people (who are actually freelance bounty hunters) can find out all your registered vehicles and when you bought them.
The bottom line is that there is absolutely no caution or privacy in German government.
With such careless standards, it's not surprising that a lot of this Data trickles into the wrong hands. Indeed, many private Databases are carbon copies of the official Persons Database.
Also, don't forget that Germany has been a true pioneer in data retention.
So whenever German people say "we take data protection seriously because of the Nazis" I can ony laugh.
The politicians who are bashing Google are the same people who have in recent years passed some of the worst privacy abusing legislation ever. Kicking a fuss about Google taking pictures is just to divert attention away from the true privacy abuses that are sactioned by the government.

Re:Privacy laws

[maxxxx]

I think the correct analogy would be walking out on my porch and yelling sensitive information and somebody driving by and recording it and storing it somewhere. That's different from just hearing it.

Re:Privacy laws

[Anonymous Coward]

Do you mean IP addresses? That would at least be believable. What good would a map of MAC addresses be?

MAC addresses, that are guaranteed unique and stuck to a device for life (theoretically -- although many routers can adopt an arbitrary MAC to "clone" the router they're replacing), accessible on all networks (regardless of encryption), and great for geolocation, which is what Google obviously wants them for (and what GP suggested)... and you're asking what good a map of them would be?

But you think they want IP addresses, meaning those ones usually handed out by DHCP (thus volatile), almost always on class C private subnets, and (at least around here) almost always on the same two (192.168.0, 192.168.1) subnets? And it doesn't even give you that useless data for encrypted networks, since (duh) the IP addresses are encrypted, too. For geolocation, aparently, since you didn't dispute that bit? That's your definition of "believable"?

... wasn't intentionally recorded (according to Google, which is believable.)

I don't believe that for a second. Perhaps permission wasn't acquired from management and legal council, but that's not the same thing as unintentional.

As for the inability to believe that it was unintentional, /. comments when the all-your-data-are-belong-to-google story broke the other day were basically three comments, repeated over and over:

• People spewing BS about how you _can't_ unintentionally collect data, because that would mean collecting more data, which is obviously more work, right? (Relying on intuition only, with no computer or network knowledge at all involved.)
• People replying to the above with the counterargument that the easiest thing is to dump all received packets, and filter it for the data you want -- that writing an on-the-fly filter to record just the data of interest is more work, not less. (This argument only requires a clue about how wireless networking works and a vague notion of programming, but no direct experience.)
• People saying it was quite believable because $SNIFFER (mostly kismet, but some others were mentioned) defaults to saving all packets received, so if the Google guys set up their wifi scanner using off-the-shelf software (as anyone sane would), it would be easy to forget to configure that option out. (These guys are speaking from direct experience in the exact field we're discussing).

If you'd read that discussion at all, you'd understand that either Google is paying the world's largest army of astroturf defenders, or that accidental data collection was in fact quite plausible. If you had any knowledge of networking (don't worry, you've already disproved that with your previous point) and programming, of course, you'd have realized it to start with.

So, in summary, either you don't know what you're talking about and haven't even been following the discussion to try to inform yourself, or are simply blinded by corporation-hate. Either way, why the fuck are you wasting our time and bandwidth with your ignorant comments?

Re:Privacy laws

[Domo-Sun]

The radio broadcasts are intended to be listened to. Browsing the net in private to read or look at porn is not the same as being the operator of a radio station.

Re:Privacy laws

[mjwalshe]

well i'me sure John de Chastelain could help :-) not to sure id be keen on handing it over to the German (or any for that matter) Govenment.

John de Chastelain is involved in the decomisioning of arms in NI BTW

Re:Privacy laws

[DamnStupidElf]

So where can the law reasonably draw the line at what is acceptable to record and what is not?

It may be necessary to record traffic for any number of reasons, so why isn't Google's reason to record traffic legitimate? Is it because they weren't trying to troubleshoot their own network? Is it because they recorded entire data packets?

If it's the former, then it seems like basic research into the usage of the public wireless spectrum could also be prohibited.

If it's the latter reason it seems like an undue burden placed on the recorder to filter "private" traffic out of the public airwaves. For instance, if an access point is not broadcasting its SSID but is operational, it is necessary to process all traffic in order to detect its MAC address for geolocation purposes. It may not be feasible to process this data in realtime while driving around town, and recording it for later processing is the only option. To me, there are dozens of legitimate reasons one might want to record a significant portion of packets that are broadcast on a public unlicensed spectrum for later analysis. It depends on the legal definition of which packets are "private." Any reasonable legal system would not consider SSID broadcasts from an AP as prviate (I hope...), but what about the number of MAC addresses that are associated with that AP? The number of IP addresses? The number of packets? The protocols used in the packets?

Re:Privacy laws

[dissy]

I can't walk out on my porch and yell sensitive information then fine you for having heard it.

Well, unless you live in Germany ;}

Then you can fine them for having heard you, and the Government will demand they turn over at least one ear to verify what was heard!

Re:Privacy laws

[dissy]

Seriously, security is the answer to security. Making it illegal to detect and record open-air RF is like making it illegal to see things.

In Britain it is illegal to receive certain publicly broadcast RF if you do not pay the BBC, and it is actively enforced.
(AKA Over the air television)

In USA it is illegal to see certain things, and having done so can easily get you a life sentence in prison. In fact the law requires you to report the fact you saw it, so you will only get a short stay in prison instead of the rest of your life.
(AKA Porn of 18+ year old people, but where someone somewhere claims they are under 18... Or a cartoon, stick figure drawing, or story describing such a picture as well...)

There is already too many bad ideas for them to draw on, but don't think the law being totally out of touch with reality will have any effect on them being made, passed, and enforced :{

Re:Privacy laws

[zuperduperman]

> now we want to see, what you have collected, as we don't see any more reason to trust you"

So all the government should have to do for people to start handing over their private property is to declare they don't trust them?

Gee, I have bad feeling about you, hand over all your hard drives please.

If this is really the rationalization here then it's a very scary and worrying precedent (and if not a precedent then it's even more scary).

Re:Privacy laws

[Jedi Alec]

I can expect a unicorn to stand outside my door and fart rose petals, but it doesn't mean that my expectation has any legal basis.

Excellent. So why don't you come over here, follow me around filming me in a public area without my permission and watch what happens when I file charges?

Re:Privacy laws

[Jedi Alec]

If you stand on a street corner and yell back and forth at your neighbor across the street, is somebody standing 100 feet away from you with a tape recorder capturing your conversation violating your privacy?

If it can be reasonably assumed that he is there to record the 2 of us...then yes he is. Of course the whole yelling across the street thing is a bit of a strawman, but if I am walking on the sidewalk with somebody else discussing at a normal tone of voice and some jackass follows us with a cam...then that is illegal.

Re:Privacy laws

[chaboud]

There is already too many bad ideas for them to draw on, but don't think the law being totally out of touch with reality will have any effect on them being made, passed, and enforced :{

I'm with you there, sadly...

Re:Privacy laws

[Fnord666]

I seriously hope more EU countries will demand the same thing.

Me too. Maybe Google can just give each country a copy of the hard drives so they can destroy them properly.

Re:Privacy laws

[Fnord666]

she said in a statement released by her office.

Funny but the first time I read this I thought it said orifice.

Re:Privacy laws

[severoon]

I don't know that the current state of the laws are a great signpost here unless we're looking at similar law that's already been interpreted. In the law that directly applies, it's lagging the technology as is often the case, so simply examining what's on the books right now is not all that instructive when it comes to understanding the heart of the matter.

I think a great way to start this discussion is to establish expectation of privacy. If you peer into someone's window, you're fine. If you peer into someone's window with a camera and take a photo, you're not so fine, particularly if you start distributing it. Why? Because there's an expectation of privacy that's been violated here, even if the curtains weren't drawn. On the other hand, if the inside of the rooms aren't visible, then you're ok--the facade of the house is fair game.

Is open wifi like peering into a room? I assert that it is not--there ought not to be any expectation of privacy on an open wifi because an actual transmission is occurring here. Not a passive one, either, such as when it was ruled last year that the FBI can't monitor infrared radiation to see through walls in order to figure out of there's a meth operation or a pot house inside. A wifi signal is something that one must set up and actively broadcast, not unlike setting up and broadcasting a pirate radio station from your house.

I believe my view jibes with common sense, too...what would it mean for businesses that intend to set up public wifi for their customers or whoever to use if it's to be regarded with a "reasonable expectation of privacy"? Now if you secure your connection, ok, that's different...now one would have to go to some effort to see the contents.

Cell phone calls are certainly in a gray area, but I would hold that the expectation of most people takes into account the historical association with phone calls being private, and besides, there's no publicly available alternative. With wifi, you get built in the ability to secure it. If you choose not to do so, ok, that's up to you. No problem on my side, just don't expect that if you take your clothes off in the public square I'll afford you the same privacy as if you do the same in a public bathroom stall.

Of course, complicating this issue is that I'm using American mores around privacy, and those do not match those of Europeans. But to some extent I believe what I'm arguing here ought to be universally true. For instance, the French idea that one can control whether one's image is recorded on the public street is fraught with complications because it simply doesn't accord with reality...

Re:Privacy laws

[Dare nMc]

IP address would be useless, 90+% of them will be behind a NAT device (and thus mostly be similar to 192.168.100.1), the majority of the rest wouldn't be permanent addresses, so wouldn't be reliable after just a week. Unless you logged into the networks, and did a traceroute to a outside network, ip addresses would be useless.

Just bring up your wireless "Site Monitor" in any major city and you will see dozens of unique mac addresses that a) will likely be the same a year from now b) not require a connection to see (like the IP would.) Thus you could run a program on your laptop that would gather those MAC's, send them to google, and google could a) give you a location within a block (indoors, outdoors, un-affected by solar flares...) b) google can refine the map of AP's in your area.

You would need a decent seed, to get people to give up this information in exchange for a location, thus what google is logging. With Mac address and signal strength You could locate someone withing a couple cubicles at my work. With GPS you could locate which door they walked in, at best. With IP address you could tell it was a mesh network, little else.

Re:Privacy laws

[khchung]

If you caught me sneaking out of your home with some of your stuff, will you just ask me to hand your stuff back and let me go? No way! You call the police and they will investigate my home to see if I have other stolen goods hidden, AND they will prosecute me according to the law.

Google got caught violating EU Laws, the correct response is for EU authorities to investigate the evidence to see the scope of crime, and follow through the legal process.

Deleting the data collected is basically destroying evidence here.

Re:Privacy laws

[drewzhrodague]

geolocation, which is what Google obviously wants them for

Bingo. A neat idea made almost moot with GPS chips in cell phones. If you know where the WiFi is, you can look up the location of the WiFi via Google -- without a GPS. I mentioned in a similar /. article about placelab.org which I think maps whichever radio they're able to get data from.

I experimented with this stuff back in 2002 when I created wifimaps.com, which is a wardriving map application, which harvests data from wardrivers. I'm not a math guy, so I used a weighted average for estimating the WIFi signal source. Mapserver is kinda neat too, which I used since Google Maps didn't exist yet.

Re:Privacy laws

[Zerth]

Germany only wants it because it is a crime to have unsecured wifi. They just want to hand out a bunch of fines.

Google should send them a bunch of folded platters that have been heated to the Curie point.

Re:Privacy laws

[Anonymous Coward]

More accurate analogy, leaving the blinds open and being surprised that a photo that happened to contain your house also shows your sofa and you are complaining that cropping out that part is an insufficient privacy correction.

Re:Privacy laws

[MokuMokuRyoushi]

Making it illegal to detect and record open-air RF is like making it illegal to see things.

That's a terrible analogy. First of all, I don't care how many times you detect my WiFi network. Just don't go poking around. To put that in perspective - I don't have a clip-lock on my journal. Sure, look at the cover, I couldn't care less. But flip a page open? Whether on not I should have locked it is just pork for an argument. Yeah, you're right - I should have. But you've violated my privacy, whether or not you gain or do something with the information you accessed. But then you go a step further - you archive the two sentences you read, just in case they'll be useful to you.

NOSE OUT.

That's the difference. You made a conscious decision to violate my privacy. And as the GP stated... that's illegal.

Re:Privacy laws

[Anonymous Coward]

Europeans have learned some hard lessons from history, some of them still within living memory. One of them is a healthy distrust of government;

This is the Europe of the social democracies, with cradle-to-grave healthcare, strong employment regulation (and every other kind of regulation) and all the other wonderful stuff the State provides that US liberals are always complaining we don't get here? Those people distrust their governments? ROTFL.

Re:Privacy laws

[Merc248]

Guy #1, yelling: "SENSITIVE INFORMATION"
Guy #2: "What is this I don't even"

*Guy #2 is thrown into a white room, and is prodded with large sticks for hours on end*

Re:Privacy laws

[henrik.falk]

To close that gap the Germans will now also fine people for having an open wi-fi.

Re:Privacy laws

[CarbonShell]

Not quite. Basically the Allies got rid of the top layer of Nazis and left the rest.

There was some cleansing of Nazi party members, but sadly they were often the wrong people. f.i. teachers, bureaucrats, basically people who HAD to join the Nazi party or loose their jobs. Though they lost them afterwards for exactly that.

F.i. one police officer in the Town where I am from and who oversaw and managed the deportation of the Jews, later became Chief of Police and a high member of the Conservative party.

Allies basically made sure, as they so often do, that only the RIGHT governments would come to power. If it even looked like it would go to the left, they would have stepped in.
This is obvious if we look at what happened in Greece after WW2.

There was no mass brainwashing or anything. Same (though a lot less) Germans that got a really good spanking for being so friggn dumb.

Also you should note that the stance of the Allies after the war was also not well thought through and even changed. First they wanted to make Germany an agricultural country (the genius behind that one should have been promoted to manage the Arctic) but when the Red threat was starting to build, they changed their minds as they thought a strong Germany would be a better buffer against invading Reds.

Thus the Marshall-Plan was no act of kindness but one of necessity and real-politik.

Re:Privacy laws

[CarbonShell]

I agree. It would just save them the effort of collecting the data themselves.

One thing about Germany is that they have the 'forbidden fruit' laws. In the US anything you collect on an illegal search is deemed illegal to use. Not so in Germany.
They just need an excuse to search your house any whatever they find, they can use. Regardless if it was for the intended purpose or not.

Re:Privacy laws

[jeyk]

Not even receive. In Germany it is illegal for you to receive radio transmissions that you are not the intended recipient of. For example, you cannot listen to air traffic control radio if you are not a pilot or ATC. IANAL, so I cannot tell where accidental reception (which is not illegal) stops and intentional reception (which is) starts, but the law is clear that you must not receive communications that are not intended for you.

Re:Privacy laws

[Hognoxious]

Clearly Google just wants the MAC addresses to have as a GPS backup in the future...

Do you mean IP addresses? That would at least be believable. What good would a map of MAC addresses be?

Well said. Round here you get a static IP address for life (unless you move house), but are obliged to exchange your router every month via a government scheme that redistributes them randomly around the country.

Re:Privacy laws

[RMH101]

Can we have more of this kind of thing, please? A succinct post that covers all cases and summarises why we shouldn't bitchfight over the same stupid, easily refutable point over and over again?

Re:Privacy laws

[RMH101]

Very well played, sir.

Re:Privacy laws

[RMH101]

I don't have a soul, you insensitive clod! Someone stole it by taking a picture of me

Re:Privacy laws

[icebraining]

Clearly Google just wants the MAC addresses to have as a GPS backup in the future

They use it right now for mobile devices with no GPS.

Google Maps running on an E65 (no GPS) spotted me inside my house. Of course, in this case it was probably using the cell towers (they record their location too), but in a device with only Wifi (netbooks, PDAs, etc), they use the surrounding APs to locate it.

Re:Privacy laws

[icebraining]

Cell phone calls are certainly in a gray area, but I would hold that the expectation of most people takes into account the historical association with phone calls being private, and besides, there's no publicly available alternative.

GSM encrypts calls. It may be a weak encryption system, but breaking it still unlawful, like breaking WEP.

Re:Privacy laws

[Anonymous Coward]

> In Britain it is illegal to receive certain publicly broadcast RF if you do not pay the BBC
No, the illegal bit is having equipment capable of receiving such broadcasts, you don't have to actually receive any BBC transmissions at all to be guilty of avoiding paying the licence fee.

Re:Privacy laws

[Anonymous Coward]

My netbook scans exactly the same thing every day in my car also when driving through Germany.

So are most teen cellphone users.
I just hope the German Government will never know.

Re:Privacy laws

[Anonymous Coward]

It' not against the law in germany to operate an unsecured wireless network. Some judges have ruled that an operator of such a network may be liable for civil damages e.g. in a copyright infringement lawsuit, even if he did not up/download the files himself or does not know who did.

Re:Privacy laws

[sac13]

Making it illegal to detect and record open-air RF is like making it illegal to see things.

Being that visible light is part of the EM spectrum, that's exactly what it's like...

Re:Privacy laws

[Dare nMc]

A neat idea made almost moot with GPS chips in cell phones.

GPS can be very limiting in small devices in urban environments. With enough data points, Wifi MAC addresses should be able to get locations in buildings, and convergence time would be eliminated. The 11 channel GPS units with accel's may not have as many issues while walking city streets, but the cheaper hand-held GPS's (which is what I would think the cell phone chips would be more akin to) cannot get convergence on sidewalks in many citys...

Re:Privacy laws

[Saint Fnordius]

After trying my best to understand the issues involved, I think it boils down to the following:

- Most wireless routers broadcast a signal, a sort of "hey, I'm here, and my name is..." so that other devices can find them. It's this signal that Google is interested in. I consider this signal a "chirp".
- Since Google's interested in mapping these "chirps", they record the broadcasted signals. Most comments and reports I've read suggest they used off the shelf components. To me, this step resembles using a normal microphone and tape deck to record bird chirps.
- In the process of recording the info Google thought was acceptable, they discovered that they were inadvertantly recording other data as well, things that were personal and possibly unlawful to record in the EU. Falling back on my metaphor, it's as if reviewing the tapes to catalogue the bird calls, they discovered they were also recording private conversations from people passing by the microphone.
- Now as I understand it, Google at this stage (three years ago) decided to not tell anyone since they weren't using the data. That's their claim, and for now there is no reason to doubt it. "We're just interested in the chirps," is what they seemed to have thought, "and we won't keep the parts of the tape that aren't relevant, so let's not get people worked up over nothing."
- But someone did get worked up, and now the German government wants to have a look since they don't trust the people at Google. Google, for its part, doesn't trust the government inspectors with the data and would rather just let them "incinerate the tapes" with no one taking a further peek on them.

It seems to me that the real issue here is how the German government doesn't trust Google not because they suspect Google is nefarious, but because Google has been too starry-eyed about making data available and forgetting that there are people behind that data whose lives will be changed against their will. Google on its part seems to be acting out of embarrassment and a genuine desire to do good. However, that means also not letting any cop take a peek, so they're holding out until they feel the auditor can be trusted as well. I also suspect that Google itself doesn't know what's in the raw data, and is afraid they might get accused of illegal filesharing, kiddy porn, or whatever an ambitious prosecutor can glean out of the files.

And in the meantime, what to do about the recorded chirps? Apparently they were legal, since the whole brouhaha is about accidental recording. That means the data Google *meant* to record must be acceptable...

Re:Privacy laws

[jvkjvk]

Google does not break laws, they are doing this legally, (at worst) in an unregulated area - collecting publicly available data on an industry scale.

Of course. No corporation breaks laws.

But you might want to actually check out Germany's laws. Capturing OTA broadcasts of things like emails is indeed illegal.

So, perhaps they are just breaking laws on an industry scale.

Unless an independent party verifies what indeed was collected, and how much, it is in question just how much they broke the law.

I presume from your standpoint that we should just trust whatever they tell us they did, let them destroy the evidence of their wrong doing, instead of getting an accurate accounting.

Regards.

Re:Privacy laws

[chaboud]

I was hoping that someone would see it through the same scientific lens.

High-five for you, nerd.

Re:Privacy laws

[Anonymous Coward]

Believe me, nobody gives a rat's ass about those stupid jews.

Re:Privacy laws

[Anonymous Coward]

As I understand it is the same German government who was willing to pay for secret Swiss bank data.

"Like every reasonable person, I support doing everything we can to clamp down on tax evasion," Merkel told reporters.

Yes, you are right, they will just destroy the data and will never use them...

Re:Privacy laws

[Hognoxious]

If you know where the WiFi is, you can look up the location of the WiFi via Google -- without a GPS.

I appear to be in the middle of NETGEAR, DLINK and linksys. So I'm in central Brussels, no, it's Montreal ... whoaaaa, now I'm in Johannesburg! I'm starting to get a bit of motion sickness now...

Re:Privacy laws

[Acaeris]

Perfect example of this is Google Maps on the iPod Touch (works purely off of WiFi as there is no GPS or Cell Radio)

Re:Privacy laws

[severoon]

That's all well and good, but can you say specifically what data has been recorded that violates privacy? That's the essential ingredient that's missing from this discussion. You have likened this information to snippets of private conversation of people walking by your microphone. Until we know what it is, we can't say it's like that. It's more likely that it's just people that inadvertently put stuff out on public wifi that they shouldn't have. In that case, it's more like someone using a loud voice to discuss a private matter and being embarrassed after the fact when they realize everyone's listening...but that's not the listener's fault.

Re:Privacy laws

[Curian]

If you stand on a street corner and yell back and forth at your neighbor across the street, is somebody standing 100 feet away from you with a tape recorder capturing your conversation violating your privacy?

Privacy is defined as

1. the state of being private; retirement or seclusion.

2. the state of being free from intrusion or disturbance in one's private life or affairs: the right to privacy.

3. secrecy.

4. Archaic . a private place.

At no time does a conversation among 1- many person ( and yes 1 said because there are some people that talk to themselves) yelling back and forth constitute privacy. This is exactly the problem, Google was found to be collecting information from wireless devices that where unsecured. I would say if Google's camera van is rolling around and trying to attack secured networks then there would be a problem but this is not the case. I am not up to date on any laws from Germany but with a lot of country's now a days it is illegal to have unsecured wireless/ having your access point found to be downloading pirated material. If this is the case for Germany Google is doing more for their privacy then you give them credit for. An easy fix for this is unless you know what you are doing, wire your network or secure your wireless.

Re:Privacy laws

[Anonymous Coward]

No, Open WiFi is putting a sign on your front door that says "My Door is Unlocked". Your WiFi device is *broadcasting* this information that it is open. Bitching about someone writing down all the homes that have unlocked doors (because their owners were too fucking stupid to not broadcast that the door is locked, or better yet, lock it in the first place) is just stupid.

It's unfortunate that Google just doesn't say "ah, good call. guess we'll leave then" and shut off all operations. It's definitely a "cut off your nose to spite your face" sort of reaction, but it'd be nice to hear what sort of bitching would go up because EU citizens couldn't use google. It'd definitely make me roffle for sure.

What???

[Anonymous Coward]

What happened to "Do No Evil"?

Its become "Do No Evil (*)"

(*) Except on Mondays, Wednesdays, Thursdays, Saturdays, Sundays, after 4pm, if it makes us lots of money or if we just cant be bothered with our fake holier than thou image.

Re:What???

[WrongSizeGlass]

(*) Except on Mondays, Wednesdays, Thursdays, Saturdays, Sundays, after 4pm, if it makes us lots of money or if we just cant be bothered with our fake holier than thou image.

Since today is Tuesday, Google must not be evil today. See ya' tomorrow!

Re:What???

[Anonymous Coward]

(*) Except on Mondays, Wednesdays, Thursdays, Saturdays, Sundays, after 4pm, if it makes us lots of money or if we just cant be bothered with our fake holier than thou image.

Re:What???

[Torodung]

What happened to "Do No Evil"?

It was replaced by "initial public offering."

You didn't see that one coming?

--
Toro

Re:What???

[gyrogeerloose]

What happened to "Do No Evil"?

Nothing ever happened to it, it never meant anything to begin with. It was just yet more crap spewed out by a corporate officer to make himself and his company look like white-hats when they're really no different than any other corporation.

Re:What???

[interkin3tic]

What happened to "Do No Evil"?

Its become "Do No Evil (*)"

(*)intentionally

It was a mistake. Mistakes happen no matter what your intentions. Prove to me google was trying to profit off of this or shut up.

Great News!

[e2d2]

Oh good. I was worried it would end up in the wrong hands.

Re:Great News!

[Dyinobal]

My thoughts exactly, how does giving the wifi data to a government solve anything. I'm sure there is plenty of spook agencies that love this kind of stuff.

Re:Great News!

[Gravitron 5000]

You answered your own question. It solves the problem of the government needing a warrant/subpoena to get their hands on this data.

Re:Great News!

[timeOday]

My thoughts exactly, how does giving the wifi data to a government solve anything.

So they can determine whether google did anything wrong, and if so, google can be punished to prevent them or somebody else from repeating this in the figure. (What, too obvious?)

As for the other concerns, do you really think prosecutions of private citizens will arise from this? I don't. But I do think the govt. should collect just enough of the drives, say a randomly selected 1%, to determine what actually happened.

Re:Great News!

[sopssa]

They only wanted one HDD to see what kind of data Google collected, not all of them.

Re:Great News!

[chaboud]

Google's already freely stipulated that they did something wrong. If they're willing to admit that they broke the law and collected this data, then why would the German government still need this data?

Oh, that's right, only because it's a treasure-trove of never-needed-a-warrant-in-the-first-place data.

An independent auditor is the nearest thing we'll get to fair inspection of this, but they'll just hand that crap over to the government, anyway. Let's face it:

1. This data is most probably completely useless junk.
2. On the off chance that there are little nuggets of valuable information in this data-set, the only way to safeguard the individuals who had their data recorded is to delete every copy of it.

The EU's prevailing belief, that businesses tend towards malfeasance and must be held in check by the government, is a valid one. The founding American belief, that governments tend towards malfeasance and must be held in check by the people, is also valid. Google's trepidation certainly seems more populist than corporatist in this case.

Re:Great News!

[bughunter]

how does giving the wifi data to a government solve anything.

That was my first thought, too. First of all, handing it over doesn't guarantee that you haven't made a copy of it. And distributing either an original or a copy doesn't guarantee any security, even if it is the German government.

Besides, there's the obligatory troll, you know who *else* was a German government? Someone's gonna go there...

Re:Great News!

[Arancaytar]

Yeah.

I mean, it was worrisome that Google had that much private data, but my government? That's perfectly fine. I'd trust them with anything.

(Or maybe it was "I'd trust them to do anything.")

Re:Great News!

[maxwell demon]

Besides, there's the obligatory troll, you know who *else* was a German government? Someone's gonna go there...

And in the past, America had racial discrimination laws. Therefore the American government must consist of racists ...

Re:Great News!

[e2d2]

Poor Germany, always getting picked on just because it started two world wars and tried to extinguish a race.

Re:Great News!

[maxwell demon]

The problem is only people making wrong conclusions about today's Germany from that.

Re:Great News!

[e2d2]

Yeah, but it's hard to fight ignorance. To equate today's Germany with WWII-era Germany is simply out of touch. Germany is one of the most advanced and one of the most progressive states in the world. We(US citizens) joke, but we look to Germany for a lot of answers.

Hmmm

[WrongSizeGlass]

Google [has] until May 26 to hand over one of the hard drives that it had used to collect and store information in Germany, where Street View is not yet available.

Through a spokesman, Google reiterated its offer to destroy the WLAN data in conjunction with regulators, but stopped short of saying it would hand over a hard drive, which would allow regulators to see for the first time what kind of data had been collected.

So they're happy to "destroy" is but don't want to turn it over so Germany can see exactly what they were gathering? Smells fishy to me.

Re:Hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

Or they would rather not hand it out. It's not as if it would be hard to destroy the parts they didn't want anyone to know about, anyway.

Re:Hmmm

[man_of_mr_e]

Not to mention, they want the hard drives turned over? They've never heard of, you know.. copying?

So, rather than work with google to make sure all data is destroyed, regardless of whether it was copied, they'd rather google just give them the hard drives.. cause then.. what?

Re:Hmmm

[GungaDan]

"they'd rather google just give them the hard drives.. cause then.. what?"

... Profit!

Re:Hmmm

[Monkeedude1212]

Whats fishy about it at all?

If the issue is privacy - Google is more than willing to destroy it, simple as that.

If the issue is the German Government not having it - they can go and collect this information themselves. Google put in the effort to record the data. Nothing is stopping an arm of the Government from doing the same thing. Google would be foolish to just give it away. That would essentially be wasting their time and money. I bet if they were offered money for the data, they'd consider it.

Really, there is nothing suspicious about Google's actions, but actually in the Government. It seems to me that they want to invade your privacy just as much as Google has, without doing any of the work.

That is - if you even considered this an invasion of privacy. I don't really think it is. Shouting out my journal from the rooftops isn't something I'd do if I didn't want people to hear it.

Re:Hmmm

[zazzel]

So they're happy to "destroy" is but don't want to turn it over so Germany can see exactly what they were gathering? Smells fishy to me.

If you had followed the German Ministry of the Interior, especially under Mr. Schäuble, more closely, you would destroy the hard drives yourself, FOR Google.

Why would I, as a citizen, want that Google hands over this data to the same government that's been undermining privacy rights and the principles of a *federal* state for years? A centralized taxpayer database to circumvent the illegality of central databases on citizens? Got it! (ELENA). A central database of all online & telephony connections, recently deleted by order of the Bundesverfassungsgericht (supreme court)? Had it!

But of course I still trust them with my data. Of course! Paying lip service to privacy and blaming the private sector is easy.

Re:Hmmm

[Sancho]

Maybe to hold them to the same standards to which any person would be held. I can't just give the police a copy of my hard drive if they have evidence that I've committed a crime--they'll take the whole drive.

If corporations want to be people, we need to treat them like people. My life would be severely impacted by the loss of my computing equipment--why do they get special treatment? Hell, it probably wouldn't even be a significant burden unless all of their equipment was seized (which, incidentally, is what would happen to your average person.)

Re:Hmmm

[thetoadwarrior]

Would you want a government happy to fine people for insecure networks, who just lost a big chunk of money to Greece having a list of everyone with open connections?

Why not send a government official to Google to have a quick look and over watch its destruction? If they feel Google may not actually destroy it...well it's digital data. Google could have millions of copies around the world. They could never prove a copy of the data does no exist somewhere by handing over some hardware.

Re:Hmmm

[khchung]

Destroying the data when said data is connected to a suspected violation of the law? We usually can that "destroying evidence" when a normal person tries to do that.

Re:Hmmm

[neumayr]

I think your tinfoil hat's on too tight.
Not refuting your observations of Germany's ministry of interior, but from what Google has said it has gathered, there is no value in this information they are trying to get. Just a few packets if WIFI payload data, big deal.

So, if Google has collected more information, information the Government would want, people should know about it. Or it hasn't and the Government wants to make sure. Which is a reasonable thing to do.
Still sucks for Google of course, but c'mon, that's was a pretty stupid thing to do, collecting people's traffic...

Google isn't evil

[SigILL]

Google is actually doing a good thing: now I don't have to remember the password for my wireless network; any Android device can automatically look it up on Google's servers.

Thanks, Google!

Re:Google isn't evil

[FunPika]

Huh? How would their servers have your Wi-Fi password if they were only collecting information from unprotected (as in people who don't bother to enable any form of security/password on their router) access points?

Re:Google isn't evil

[Anonymous Coward]

Apple didn't make a search engine, but google made a cell phone, so fuck google, let them rot!

Think Different
Think Better
Think Apple

Re:Google isn't evil

[socsoc]

If your wireless network was open, how would there be a password?

Re:Google isn't evil

[maxwell demon]

Actually it's apples which tend to rot, not huge numbers.

Re:Google isn't evil

[Deliveranc3]

I agree, this is something that should have been done a long time ago. It's a travesty that we don't have a map with GPS co-ordinates linked to SSIDs for open wifi. They tried to lock it down (AGAIN!) by saying that it's illegal to run an open wifi hotspot, unfortunately for them router makers have decreed that routers should ship open by default. Further complicating things is that while ISPS would love to say that only one mac address can be behind an IP at any given moment the implications are simply staggering and they'll never be able to enforce it.

Hopefully the outcome of this will be a new look at the only type of data the government has legtimately found to be harmful to the populance, child pornography. Remember that the reason we got such a nanny state is because there was a study which found that exposure to child pornography leads to the creation of pedophiles. There was a contrary study but these studies are hard to do and scientists are obviously a little reluctant to discuss where they got their materials and their research methods. Governments are happy with the result and until the pirate party comes to power we won't get more studies in this area.

What do I hope to get out of this? I'd really like to see some kind of bandwidth shaping/metering system implemented on the router, it can't be that hard to give each wifi user a 10k limit. So where's it at?

Of course "shotgunning" would have been increadibly useful for people suffering behind dial-up but we never got that either, if I had the money to pay a truly talented developer the world of internet access would look a little different, and function VERY different.

Wait?

[Anonymous Coward]

So the German government, protector of all things privacy-related, wants a copy of the data before it's destroyed? Why? The laws they say were violated don't apply to them, huh?

If they want to snoop on citizens of other countries there's much better ways of doing it. They don't see any irony in getting upset over mistaken data collection then demanding that data for themselves?

MOD PARENT UP!!

[Brett Buck]

Absolutely correct, and good analogy

Re:MOD PARENT UP!!

[PRMan]

Nonsense. This was a terrible analogy.

The correct analogy on Slashdot is:

I can't walk out on my porch and yell sensitive information then fine anyone driving by in a car for having heard it.

There. Much better.

Re:MOD PARENT UP!!

[asCii88]

Still not right.

The correct analogy is:

I can't drive down the road yelling sensitive information then fine anyone driving by in a car for having heard it.

Now it's aproaching perfection.

Re:MOD PARENT UP!!

[daff2k]

Absolutely correct, and good analogy

No, absolutely incorrect. The law in Germany and other EU countries explicitly forbids accessing computer networks you have no permission to access.

Re:MOD PARENT UP!!

[Bengie]

listening != accessing

Re:MOD PARENT UP!!

[dotgain]

listening == using ones auditory senses, it only applies metaphorically to computer operations. To most people, listening to something absolutely means accessing (or "having" access to) it.

Let me guess, you also interpret DHCPOFFER packets literally as a legal invitation as well. You're in for a nasty fright when you find out you use such words quite differently to 95% of the population.

Re:MOD PARENT UP!!

[Anonymous Coward]

If you're driving down the road, yelling sensitive information, but there's no-one there to hear you... ...then was there even really ever any car involved at all?

Re:MOD PARENT UP!!

[DamnStupidElf]

No wonder we don't see too many posters from the EU, what with their inability to access slashdot.org's network without prior authorization.

Re:MOD PARENT UP!!

[retchdog]

What matters, for better or worse, is often the public perception and norms involved rather than the technical definitions. In the US for example, it was ruled that passive infrared scanning (for a grow operation) of property from a public area counted as a search even though it was scientifically identical to normal vision. The device was rare enough, so as to violate commonly held standards of privacy.

Re:MOD PARENT UP!!

[Bengie]

Listening is your computer(brain) waiting for data to arrive in the form of sound waves.

Listening is an object awaiting data.

But sadly 95% of the population gets by with just enough intelligence or luck to reproduce. I guess one person's luck is another person's unluck.

It's probably a curse to be in that other 5% as I'm sure most Slashdotters know the feeling.

side note: I don't think DHCP is an open invitation. It's just an automated response that happens no matter what, assuming the system is working correctly.

Re:MOD PARENT UP!!

[dotgain]

Yes, of course. You're exceedingly intelligent - in the top 5% in fact - because you've learned an Object Oriented Programming Language, and applied parts of its lexicon to real life, thereby changing the definition of the law, at least in the minds of yourself and the lucky 5%. The lucky 5% who understand that computers conceive themselves, install suitable radios and take to the streets cataloguing data. 95% of use don't realise that it doesn't take a human with intent for this to happen.

Re:MOD PARENT UP!!

[jeyk]

The law in Germany also forbids receiving radio transmissions of which you are not the intended recipient.

Re:MOD PARENT UP!!

[Caetel]

Isn't a public web server implicit authorisation?

Re:MOD PARENT UP!!

[L1feless]

I am not certain of the Canadian laws here but if I am not mistaken there is at least one country in the EU who banned the use of open WiFi networks didn't they? If I were to use an open WiFi network in Germany and HACK into a government office or do something else illegal does the law protect the open WiFi owner and allow them to claim ignorance? or does it hold them partially responsible? I have to agree with the posting above. Google didn't run around the EU cracking WEP keys.They happened to capture data about WIDE OPEN networks which are broadcasting their signals for all to access openly and freely.

Re:MOD PARENT UP!!

[Anonymous Coward]

Isn't an open wifi also one?

Some serious issues here

[Anonymous Coward]

If Google acted as a reasonable company run by reasonable people, they would immediately upon discovering this have collected all the hard drives, locked them in a vault with a third party providing a second pair of eyes, and invited the privacy commissioners of every affected country to inspect the data immediately before it's fed into a shredder.

That they didn't is somehow very, very worrying.

Re:Some serious issues here

[Cyberllama]

This is what they did already with the Irish data. Nobody has ever looked at this data. Not Google, not any government. Google didn't even realize they had it.

That they ONLY did it with the Irish data is probably a sign that other governments, like the German government, would like google to give the data to them. I'm sure Google would *love* to have deleted it all already and put this whole thing behind them, but sadly they would be accused by the German government, and no doubt others, of destroying "evidence" of their "crimes". They're stuck between a rock and a hard place.

Frankly, I've been disgusted for a while by the way the German (and EU in general) governments use Google as a punching bag. Google makes an easy target because they do aggregate so much data. That's inevitable -- you can't avoid it in their business. But they have been, in general, fairly responsible with how they've used that data. Far more so than, say, Facebook. But because Google is big and scary, politicians can distract the public from their own misdeeds with investigations and hearings into the big bad bogeyman that is Google.

A few things.

[chaboud]

1. If you run an unencrypted 802.11 network, expect your data to get pwned.
2. It was an accident of code reuse (seriously, guys, code-reuse accidents happen quite often).
3. If people were just casually using the internet, https saved their stupid little asses from letting their data out in the wild.
4. Why do we trust the German government (or any EU government, for that matter) with this data more than we trust Google? I know that the EU is better about not giving companies a blank check, but let's not forget about the kind of crap that governments pull. This is a surveillance freebie, provided that the illicit persons being surveilled are professional idiots (i.e. had an open network).

Google screwed up, but has the Google-hatred here risen to such a high degree that we're okay with just handing over even accidentally-collected data to the government? I'd at least insist on an independent auditor, to make sure that government abuses of the data didn't take place. With Google's resources, I'd go so far as to take it to the (largely impotent) EU court of human rights.

Re:A few things.

[keithjr]

It all revolves around the question: how much do you trust Google? If one is operating on the assumptions that a) this isn't the end-all of Google's illicit data-mining, and b) that not all (if any) of it is accidental, there's a strong precedent to be set here. At least, in the public's hands, an independent audit is possible.

I'd say we should be more concerned about the crap private companies can pull (a problem we can't solve) with the crap that governments pull (a problem we can solve, in theory).

Re:A few things.

[Coren22]

I don't even see why this is illegal. As far as I can tell, they recorded what access points were broadcasting, from a public space. What's the big deal here? You (Germany) believe you have an expectation of privacy when you are loudly broadcasting to the four corners a welcome to connect?

Re:A few things.

[TheSync]

Why do we trust the German government (or any EU government, for that matter) with this data more than we trust Google?

When has the German government ever used information on its citizens for something bad? Oh, yeah, I remember now....

Re:A few things.

[maxwell demon]

accidental code reuse?

Error reading post #32256070.
(A)bort, (R)etry, (I)gnore, (F)ail?

Re:A few things.

[Anonymous Coward]

the fact that google voluntarily came forward about it says more for my trust than typical government cover-ups. In any event being that the only people to even have proof that the data exists is Google, if they destroy it nobody would know. for all we know it could already be gone (overwritten or otherwise)

what is the need for a public audit?
how is this activity illicit? an unsecured network broadcasts its signal in the same manner that a radio station does. is it illegal to listen to the radio where you live? using the government as a heavy handed weapon to defend an individuals stupidity is not only wrong, but thats what sets a bad precedent. an unsecured network is by very definition PUBLIC. and in case you didnt realize PUBLIC is the opposite of PRIVATE.

THERE IS NO PRIVACY VIOLATION. THESE WERE PUBLIC NETWORKS.
sorry for the caps.

Re:A few things.

[Tom]

4. Why do we trust the German government (or any EU government, for that matter) with this data more than we trust Google?

Why do we trust Google more with it than the government? Right now, only Google knows what exactly they captured. The government wants to know, too. Because they want to snoop on you? Please, be serious. Don't you think they could've their own streetview cars on every corner if they wanted to?

I personally think our current german government stinks and is probably the worst one we had since the founding of the federal republic. But a rational view says me it's a lot more likely they want the data so they can make a better estimate about how bad Google screwed up, than it is that they can't do their own surveilance and thus think a public demand for this data would help them in anything.

Though I agree an independent auditor would be best. But who do you pick? Anderson^H^H^HAccenture?

Re:A few things.

[Antimatter3009]

I can't figure out why anyone would think this isn't accidental, though. As the GP mentioned, code reuse accidents happen often enough that it's not even a stretch to believe that explanation. It's very easy to imagine an engineer using the code without fully auditing it first. Yeah, that shouldn't happen and Google should tighten up their reviews and such, but it's still just an accident. Further, what use would Google get out of random samplings of packets on random unsecured wireless networks? I can't imagine any of that would be particularly useful even if you assume that they're hellbent on world domination, and if you're going to accuse them of intentionally collecting this data, there should at least be a motive.

Re:A few things.

[maxwell demon]

an unsecured network is by very definition PUBLIC. and in case you didnt realize PUBLIC is the opposite of PRIVATE.

Where do you get your definitions from? Do you also think an open door means the house is public?

Re:A few things.

[abigsmurf]

An unlocked door is not permission to enter

Not drawing the curtains is not permission to set up a camera with a good zoom lens to record someone changing every night.

Wearing a skirt and panties is not permission for someone to point a camera upwards underneath.

Typing in your PIN publically at an ATM does not give someone permission to put up a camera to record it.

Privacy laws are based around how much you expect privacy in situations and how much someone realises they're seeing or recording something that the victim really doesn't want made shared (with public interest exceptions).

Re:A few things.

[Johann Lau]

That wasn't "the German government" though, it was the German government of that time, namely the NSDAP. Oh, also: lots of countries were fascist during that time, just less horribly good at it. Spain didn't even go through any kind of Denazification process (you know, not even an attempt), America is happily invading countries left and right... but Germans? Those are fucking Nazis, all of them, forever. Well, those that aren't too busy making sheise porn of course ^^

Re:A few things.

[neumayr]

Google came forward with it? It says something about "after prodding from the Germans" in the summary. While I don't know exactly how this prodding was done, it means the Google did not came forward voluntarily, admitting their mistake, before someone was on to them.

Unsecured WiFi networks might technically be like a radio station, but they're not meant to be. Nobody broadcasts on an open WLAN because they want an audience.
Public is not the opposite of private on every level. You should not have to give up your right for privacy in public places either. Otherwise, camera surveillance (with face recognition), vehicle tracking, high range RFID readers (for electronic passports), etc. in public places would not be a problem. But they are.

Re:A few things.

[coofercat]

1. If you run an unencrypted 802.11 network, expect your data to get pwned.

Not so - sure, it's something like leaving your front door open while you go to work, but there still has to be an illegal act perpetrated against you for there to be an actual problem. Granted, you're not going to get much sympathy from the authorities if you don't lock your front door, but that's a different problem. Germany has said open wifi is illegal - which is pretty much like saying "lock your doors, because realistically there's not much we can do for you if you don't".

4. Why do we trust the German government (or any EU government, for that matter) with this data more than we trust Google?

Because the government is supposed to represent us, the people. Google represents no one but themselves. The track records of both isn't lost on me, but you get the point. Your suggestion of an independent audit is probably the most practically fair solution.

That said, I wouldn't want you or anyone else advertising (flashmob style or something) that I'd accidentally left my front door open. Likewise, I wouldn't want google telling you I have open wifi. I'm not sure if Google make this information public (yet), but they're collecting it for a reason, so one would be reasonable to assume they want to do something with it, which will probably release it to a wider audience than just google, if not to the entire world. This is where the privacy issue lies.

Re:A few things.

[chaboud]

I never said that we trust Google more than the government. That's a false dichotomy.

The conjugate of A > B is not A < B, it's A <= B.

That said, given the crazy crap that governments on the eastern side of the Atlantic have been up to, mere corporate consumption feels more benign. From Italy's completely broken sense of transferred responsibility with Youtube to Switzerland banning minorettes to the UK's comprehensive surveillance society to France's historical insistence on the adoption of fatally weak encryption (and my family is French, so we can blame their indirect influence), corporations would have to be of the evil-villain variety to be more frightening. And, no, I wouldn't trust the US government to not abuse information either.

So, even though you went and argued against a point that I didn't make, sure, I trust Google more than I trust our governments. That's not what I was saying, but, yeah, I'm there. I'll take an unknown over a known bad any day.

Of course, we could offer to audit the data. I trust me...

Re:A few things.

[Tom]

I think you need to clear out your prejudices a bit.

Switzerland, for example, is probably the most democratic country on the planet. The ban on minorettes was not done by the government, it is the result of a popular vote on the matter.

That said, I don't trust the government much, either. Especially given that right now, we have a government that is so bad I don't even have the proper curse words anymore. It makes anarchy look like an interesting alternative. Actual anarchy, not the dreamworld one where everyone is cool and nice to each other.

But I don't trust Google, either. And when it comes to corporations its size, the government is the only entity that can take it on. So I'm happy it does.

Oh i get it.

[blair1q]

Google collected broadcast data by accident, but as yet has not violated my privacy.

So the German government wants Google to violate my privacy by giving my data to the German government.

Which is (as many have pointed out) exactly who i want to be protected from when I decide to consider my data private.

Germany needs to be sat down in the back of the EU with a tall, cone-shaped hat on its head. Again.

Re:Oh i get it.

[HeckRuler]

Right, but users like sopssa (1498795) who irrationally hate Google will support this sort of privacy violation in the name of supporting privacy. This is the point where rationality has been lost and the zealousness takes over.

Re:Oh i get it.

[tokul]

Google collected broadcast data by accident, but as yet has not violated my privacy.

It violated your privacy. If we follow your line of though, then spies don't violate your privacy. Privacy is violated only by those who get your information from spies. Spies themselves have nothing to do with it. ... Right

Re:Oh i get it.

[keithjr]

Google collected broadcast data by accident, but as yet has not violated my privacy.

Says who? Google?

Re:Oh i get it.

[Coren22]

You consider someone with a laptop spying on you? Any laptop w/ wireless can see this information, it is being broadcast to a public space.

Re:Oh i get it.

[Anonymous Coward]

Spies -almost by definition- do not spontaneously admit to spying and apologize for it publicly.
By abduction - your analogy sucks.

Re:Oh i get it.

[bughunter]

I don't consider anything I broadcast private. That's why I encrypt it if I plan to broadcast anything potentially sensitive.

You'd think that even the smallest minds in the German government could understand broadcast =/= private, almost by definition.

Re:Oh i get it.

[thetoadwarrior]

As far as I'm concerned if you're pushing your info onto the streets and a spy finds it then the spy did nothing wrong. Face it though, the spy won't do that as he's part of the government and grabbing data on you from the comfort of his desk.

Re:Oh i get it.

[MrJones]

There is accident in "detailled data collection". It would be nice to see whats inside those hard drive!

Re:Oh i get it.

[MrJones]

I mean, there is *no* accident in "detailled data collection"...

Re:Oh i get it.

[abigsmurf]

They accidentally collected this data? Yeah right.

Lets assume the quality control for code vital for a project costing many millions was slack enough to let this kind of feature slip by test.

Would they have failed to notice them filling dozens of HDDs a week when they should've only needed a small number for a country?

When they went home and looked over the data, you think they didn't notice that they were capturing significant amounts of data alongside SSID, IP and location information?

They knew all about this and did nothing to stop it. Heck they probably saw it as a bonus (must've kept doing it for a reason, the data storage would eat up valuable budget money)

Re:Oh i get it.

[khchung]

Exactly. People who think Google could have done this "accidentally" must not have ever done any project involving storing data.

The data Google collected must have gone through tens of Google employee, you know, the Google that is famous for its very high bar on hiring only those highly skilled, motivated, engaged, creative employees, AND the company's main expertise is data minning.

Is it likely that all of them didn't notice the extra bulk of data coming in? Heck, some of them might even have been using thier famous 20% time analyzing this data for we know!

Re:Oh i get it.

[tokul]

You consider someone with a laptop spying on you? Any laptop w/ wireless can see this information, it is being broadcast to a public space.

If that someone records what I am broadcasting on his laptop, then yes. If google haven't violated privacy, then German government can't request data that Google doesn't have.

Re:Oh i get it.

[Sockatume]

You're assuming that they were "capturing significant amounts of data" (versus the expected amount) and are extrapolating to a deliberate data-snooping conspiracy as a consequence. A more parsimonius explaination is that they captured an insignificant amount of data and correspondingly no conspiracy exists.

Re:Oh i get it.

[ZorbaTHut]

Dude, it's Google. When I worked there I used hundreds of gigabytes as scratch space and then forgot to delete them. How much bandwidth do you think is really used by an average Wifi link? It's not really all that much - I'd be surprised if they ended up with more than a few gigabytes from driving around every day.

And chances are very good that "looking over the data" was a completely automated process. It's not like they're going to have humans pore over gigs of data.

Re:Oh i get it.

[Anonymous Coward]

The entire business model of Google revolves around filling dozens of HDDs a week for every project under the sun. As long as you are supposed to be collecting data, nobody is going to monitor exactly how much you are using unless it goes out of control. And in a company that has been indexing the entire web for years, "out of control" is a very, very high bar for data usage.

As for mistakes never slipping by, I seem to recall Google blacklisting the entire internet as malware a while back. Really, do you think the top people at Google wouldn't have realized that intercepting and storing data from unsecured private networks that had nothing to do with them was a BAD IDEA? What are they going to use the data for? A 15-second snippet of someone's cell phone conversation is not going to lead to good automated analysis for selling ads. You think they are just going to sit around and listen to these for yuks? Any moron would know the backlash would be awful, and Google certainly knew Streetview was under privacy scrutiny. This was a royal screwup, not a deliberate misdeed.

Re:Oh i get it.

[Deliveranc3]

You failed kindergarten sharing 101 didn't you.

Seriously we have encryption, at some point we'll all have to share our access points if we want to move away from GPRS/3G. You understand bandwidth is a utility, they want to make it a "service."

Paranoid people like you are holding us back.

Luddite.

Re:Oh i get it.

[__aatdha9242]

Would they have failed to notice them filling dozens of HDDs a week when they should've only needed a small number for a country?

From TFA:

Google last week said it had collected 600 gigabytes of data from unsecured wireless area networks, or WLANS, from around the world as its roving cars compiled a photo archive for Street View.

600GB for the entire world? Compared to the amount of image data they must have collected that's barely a drop in the ocean, hardly as glaringly obvious as you make it out to be.

Re:Oh i get it.

[blair1q]

Actually, people who think Google even knew how much data they would be collecting when they turned on the sniffer must not have ever worked outside an anal-retentive database shop.

In the real world, espeically in Google's half of the real world, space is cheap and data is to be mined, not cultivated. You generally don't care how large things are or what sort of cruft comes along with the data fields you want. Structures have hundreds of properties, and you have shit to get done, so you find yours, put their names in your code, and go to lunch.

Someone said, "we want a wardriving map. To do that we need to collect the headers of wireless traffic , so turn on the sniffer". Then went off to write a line or two of Python code to pull the location and connectivity info from the data files they'd be getting back, and another line to stuff it into the Google Maps API.

Everyone below them turned on the sniffer and started storing data. Did they care what else they were collecting? No. Did they know they were breaking the law? No. Did they know that they were taking too much data? No. They were doing what their boss told them to do and it wasn't hurting anyone that they could see.

As others have said, 600 GB, worldwide, over the life of the project, being less than a disk drive these days, would be way below Google's radar for "a big file", and it's not one big file. It's a bunch of little files loaded to the server farm from the StreetView cars every day, along with a pile of huge image files. I'd be surprised if anyone had any inkling of how big they were supposed to be vs. how big they were. You don't, and you're thinking about the size disparity as a concept, when they didn't have a reason to.

So it's likely nobody was analyzing the data for length, and it's almost certain nobody was culling it for the private data, since they didn't need it to make their map. I'm completely not surprised it went on as long as it did.

Re:Germany giving orders

[Trevelyan]

You're obviously not a British football fan...

Getting punished for "doing the right thing"

[Valacosa]

It's sad that Google is getting punished for "doing the right thing" and being honest about their screw-up.

Google: Oops! We accidentally collected all this data we weren't supposed to. Sorry, but we thought you should know. We'll just be deleting* that now... Germany: NO! You don't respect EU laws! Turn that data over!

If Google had just kept quiet and didn't admit their wrongdoing, nobody would have known about the issue, and there wouldn't be any of the wrangling we see now. But should a company keep quiet whenever it fucks up? A culture of denial is worse. It's sad, because it's exactly this sort of persecution which creates a culture where companies never admit anything, ever.

* Except the legal department probably advised them against deleting the data right after the confession, just in case something like this happened.

Re:Getting punished for "doing the right thing"

[Johann Lau]

Google: Oops! We accidentally collected all this data we weren't supposed to. Sorry, but we thought you should know.

But that's not what has happened *at all*. From the article of the slashdot story this story links to:

The Internet giant said it would stop collecting Wi-Fi data from its StreetView vans, which workers drive to capture street images and to locate Wi-Fi networks. The company said it would dispose of the data it had accidentally collected.

Alan Eustace, senior vice president of engineering and research for Google, wrote in a blog post that the company uncovered the mistake while responding to a German data-protection agency's request for it to audit the Wi-Fi data, amid mounting concerns that Google's practices violated users' privacy.

They're basically saying "let's just forget anything happened" by offering to delete the data. Uh-nuh, not really how it works. If they didn't pay attention and ran software that violated privacy laws, they should be punished. THEN we can delete the data...

it's exactly this sort of persecution which creates a culture where companies never admit anything, ever.

What are you talking about? What "persecution"? If they violated laws, they get punished. Where's the problem? I'd rather have corporations involuntarily investigated, than then "admitting their wrongdoings" and there being no consequences for it.

Re:Getting punished for "doing the right thing"

[lucm]

> It's sad that Google is getting punished for "doing the right thing" and being honest about their screw-up.

This comment reminds me of the movie "The Quiz Show", when Van Doren confesses his role in the rigging of the game during a House Committee meeting. At first some people congratulates him for coming forward, but then the chairman says: there is no merit in telling the simple truth. Then everybody applauses.

Re:Getting punished for "doing the right thing"

[Tom]

It's sad that Google is getting punished for "doing the right thing" and being honest about their screw-up.

It's not as if they discovered it themselves and brought it to the attention of the authorities. On the contrary: The authorities were concerned, questioned Google, and Google discovered: "oops..."

And yes, it is proper to punish someone who admits his guilt. It is also proper to punish someone who lies until the end harsher, but saying "ok, I did it" does not get you off free.

Re:Getting punished for "doing the right thing"

[Anonymous Coward]

Alan Eustace, senior vice president of engineering and research for Google, wrote in a blog post that the company uncovered the mistake while responding to a German data-protection agency's request for it to audit the Wi-Fi data, amid mounting concerns that Google's practices violated users' privacy.

They're basically saying "let's just forget anything happened" by offering to delete the data. Uh-nuh, not really how it works. If they didn't pay attention and ran software that violated privacy laws, they should be punished. THEN we can delete the data...

This is *so* ./ .
1) - have a news item that cries wolf all over
2) - have everyone kick the poster for crying wolf
3) - read TFA, and discover that there actually was a wolf...

These sort of news posters have a special name: trolls. Journalism is a (rare?) skill that too often is harnessed for the purpose of selling advertisement...

Re:Getting punished for "doing the right thing"

[maxwell demon]

It's sad, because it's exactly this sort of persecution which creates a culture where companies never admit anything, ever.

Yeah, too bad we persecute violations of the law. If we wouldn't do it, maybe more people would admit violating the law.

Re:Getting punished for "doing the right thing"

[Johann Lau]

lolwut? I basically corrected the person I replied to, who claimed Google was just "being honest", which is simply not true. If you have anything to actually *say*, do so - instead of just skipping that "bit" and jumping to the caringly formatted conclusion heh...

Re:Getting punished for "doing the right thing"

[Cyberllama]

Technically Google did discover it themselves. They were asked for the data they had collected, they audited it internally and realized they had made a mistake. At that point, rather than try to cover it up, they came clean and admitted the error. They had only been asked to turn over the data at that point, it was still in their hands and they could theoretically have attempted to hide their mistake or claim that the data was corrupted or lost or whatever. I believe many corporations out there would have tried some shenanigans to hide this, Google came clean. They deserve some credit for that.

Re:Getting punished for "doing the right thing"

[yyxx]

What are you talking about? What "persecution"? If they violated laws, they get punished. Where's the problem?

I have yet to see a legal analysis that demonstrates that what Google violated any German laws. Right now, you just have members of a right wing German government foaming at the mouth. That's the rough equivalent of US southern politicians giving their legal opinions on something.

And if Google did violate laws, then German law needs to change; no country that calls itself democratic and free should have laws on the books that allows the government to throw people in jail for accidental reception of unencrypted broadcasts. Furthermore, the current political tempest does nothing to protect consumer privacy; Google's packet data is useless, and any prosecution of Google over this isn't going to deter the criminals that listen in on WiFi communications with the intent to defraud and harm people. The German government should educate people about the importance of encrypting their WiFi, not prosecute Google.

(And before you engage in a tu quoque, let me add that, yes, there is some legal uncertainty in the US surrounding this issue as well, and, yes, it needs to be addressed.)

Re:Getting punished for "doing the right thing"

[Johann Lau]

I have yet to see a legal analysis that demonstrates that what Google violated any German laws.

So what's the harm of looking into it then?

The German government should educate people about the importance of encrypting their WiFi, not prosecute Google.

It's not either/or though. They can very well do both, or neither. One doesn't have any bearing on the other. FFS.

And if Google did violate laws, then German law needs to change; no country that calls itself democratic and free should have laws on the books that allows the government to throw people in jail for accidental reception of unencrypted broadcasts.

Okay, assuming Germany has laws on the book to "throw people in jail" for that (I highly doubt it): the way to change these laws would be to, uh, change them... not to simply ignore them and try to wiggle the way out of it. That doesn't achieve anything.

any prosecution of Google over this isn't going to deter the criminals that listen in on WiFi communications with the intent to defraud and harm people.

And again: the lack of prosecution wouldn't achieve anything, either. If what they did was illegal, well, that's a bummer for them, end of story. If they it wasn't, what's the big deal...?

You can talk a lot about how this isn't right, or how different things would be better, but even if laws do get changed, what happened happened, and the laws that were in place at that time, do apply. What is so hard to understand about that? Is it because it's Google, because it's Germany, or both? Who's "foaming at the mouth", exactly?

Re:Getting punished for "doing the right thing"

[Tom]

Agreed. Maybe that's why the government isn't swinging a big fine-bat, you know?

Re:Getting punished for "doing the right thing"

[yyxx]

So what's the harm of looking into it then?

There is no harm in "looking into" them. However, the German government isn't "looking into them", they are stating as a fact that Google has violated German law.

not to simply ignore them and try to wiggle the way out of it. That doesn't achieve anything.

The term "ignore" implies intent; there is no evidence that Google intentionally captured packets in Germany, let alone intentionally violated German law. To many software developers, the fact that capturing unencrypted packets in a public place might get them thrown in jail would probably come as a surprise, and it is probably not illegal in most places in the world. More importantly, nobody has established as a fact that Google even violated German law. So far, that is merely an opinion expressed by some members of the German executive branch.

You can talk a lot about how this isn't right, or how different things would be better, but even if laws do get changed, what happened happened, and the laws that were in place at that time, do apply. What is so hard to understand about that?

Democracies have separation of powers. In particular, courts determines whether a law was violated, not the executive branch. When members of the executive branch state as fact to the press that "Google has violated German law", that is a serious problem. A breakdown between executive and judicial powers is a big step towards totalitarianism, and given Germany's history, it should be particularly careful not to cross that line again, as it has several times before.

The proper statement for the German government to have made would have been: "we believe Google may have violated German privacy laws and we are considering filing suit in German court unless Google voluntarily cooperates".

Re:Getting punished for "doing the right thing"

[Johann Lau]

However, the German government isn't "looking into them", they are stating as a fact that Google has violated German law.

Do you have a source for that? From the article:

"BERLIN — Google came under increased pressure in Europe on Tuesday over its collection of private data from unsecured home wireless networks as a German regulator threatened legal action if the company did not surrender a hard drive for inspection."

How does a German regulator demanding to inspect the harddrives translate to "the German Government stating as a fact that Google has violated German law"? Because of Nazi Germany? LOL?

More importantly, nobody has established as a fact that Google even violated German law.

Exactly... since the harddrives would have to be looked at for that, you know?

Re:Getting punished for "doing the right thing"

[yyxx]

How does a German regulator demanding to inspect the harddrives translate to "the German Government stating as a fact that Google has violated German law"?

You can't prove non-existence by example. Go read Aigner's and Caspar's statements to the press. Aigner, for example, talked about "Millionenfache Verletzung der Privatsphäre".

In any case, you see no problem with the notion that a bureaucrat makes a determination that a private organization has violated a law and requires them to surrender a hard drive? What exactly is the legal basis for that supposed to be? What are the safeguards? What's he going to do with that data? What if he finds someone's child pornography in that data, is the state going to prosecute those people? Can the same bureaucrat demand my hard drive or yours?

The proper course of action is that the bureaucrat goes to a prosecutor, the prosecutor goes to a judge, the judge makes a determination whether there is sufficient cause to obtain the data, writes a warrant, and decides and documents the limits that the data can be used for.

Except for legally well-defined cases, members of the executive branch deciding unilaterally to require access to people's hard drives is an absolute no-no. If this kind of conduct is legal in Germany, anybody's hard drive can be accessed by many parts of the government at any time without legal review, authorization, or proper procedures, and the data used for any purpose. Sadly, that's probably the case, and it's frightening.

Because of Nazi Germany? LOL?

Not "because" of it, but reminiscent of it. Sorry, but there still seems to be some deep and widespread problem with the German understanding of civil rights, the rule of law, and democracy. And it's not just the Nazi regime; half of Germany was a totalitarian state until 1990, complete with anti-American sentiments and bureaucrats whose supposed purpose in life was to protect the German population from evil Western companies and who spied on everybody and everything.

Re:Getting punished for "doing the right thing"

[yyxx]

"More importantly, nobody has established as a fact that Google even violated German law."

Exactly... since the harddrives would have to be looked at for that, you know?

No judge has made a legal determination that way the data was obtained is itself illegal and there is not a shred of evidence that Google recorded anything other than unencrypted data. In different words, the question of legality does not hinge on what is in the data.

On the other hand, Google's data probably contains evidence that large numbers of Germans violated German telecommunications law (transmitting private data without encryption), copyright laws (movie downloads), and censorship laws (pornography, violent games). How is the German government going to use this information?

Soon irrelavent

[Anonymous Coward]

Hi,

We have given you our last copy, we swear.

Signed,
Google

Has no one asked...

[Anonymous Coward]

Has no one asked, WHY they were collecting at all?
Aren't the Google Camera Cars for creating street navigation & visual reference?

When does sniffing for data even enter the equation at all?

Re:Has no one asked...

[Johann Lau]

it's something about finding the location of wi-fi hotspots.

Surrender your data or else.

[fahrbot-bot]

Germany Demands Google Forfeit Citizens' Wi-Fi Data

Surrender the data? Let me Google this.

Mr. Googurns

[Itninja]

""Oooh, the Germans are mad at me... I'm so scared! Oooooh, the Germans...Uh oh...The Germans are coming after me... Oh, don't let the Germans come after me... Oh, the Germans are coming after me... No, they're so big and strong... Protect me from the Germans!"

Re:Mr. Googurns

[MattGWU]

Please stop pretending you are scared of us, please, now.

Norm MacDonald

[Torodung]

Germany has certainly been keeping their eye on the search giant.

Or so the Germans would have us believe.

--
Toro

First time that shtick's ever been funny and accurate.

Who wouldn't want the data?

[robwgibbons]

I'd be willing to bet lots of governments would love to use this opportunity just to examine the WiFi data.

Re:Who wouldn't want the data?

[dbet]

Well, one possibility I see is it generating millions in revenue. Its a violation in Germany to operate an unsecured wi-fi, and carries a small fine. But if you can catch the entire country doing it all at once. Cha-ching.

Re:Who wouldn't want the data?

[Anonymous Coward]

Its a violation in Germany to operate an unsecured wi-fi, and carries a small fine.

WTF? Someone paid a small civil penalty when their open wireless network was used to illegally upload a copyrighted song. It's sad the people on Slashdot feel we need to resort to spreading lies.

Didn't Germany Just Fine Someone For Open Wireless

[Anonymous Coward]

This could be the German government grabbing at free data on open wireless (for people to fine, etc.). I think they may be more interested in free data for their own devices than 'protecting the public.'

Is this an EU rule or a German rule?

[GungaDan]

If it is EU-wide, why is Germany the only country making any noise about it?

Re:Is this an EU rule or a German rule?

[Nadaka]

Because they are the only ones who have laws that allow them to prosecute people with open wifi as contributing to copyright infringment.

Germany just wants to collect more fines

[Anonymous Coward]

After the story posted last Thursday about Germany fining someone for having an unprotected network, I have a feeling they only want this data so they can fine more people.

Re:Germany just wants to collect more fines

[anarxia]

The data was acquired illegally so it wouldn't be admissible in court for other cases.

Re:Germany just wants to collect more fines

[TedRiot]

Is this the case in Germany?

This isn't a global rule. In my country, illegally gathered evidence can be used in court just as much as legally gathered evidence, but the crimes committed while gathering the evidence can and will be prosecuted separately.

Re:Germany just wants to collect more fines

[andersh]

The German case you refer to was not about "fines" imposed by the government.

In fact it was clearly not a fine, but a liability for the expenses the complainant had issuing the cease-and-decist letter (Abmahnung). The money goes to the complaining party as compensation, the government received nothing. See where you went wrong?

The Germans even have a law clearly limiting the amount the complaining party may demand in compensation to 100 Euro. This is a pittance compared with the actual cost of hiring a lawyer and the Germans simply wanted to stop the creation of an "industry"of cease-and-decist letters issued to everyone with a BitTorrent client.

Fine Google!

[ThoughtMonster]

Google should be fined for doing the government's job without a licence.

Now gimme that data!

I don't get it.

[2obvious4u]

I don't get it. Why the big fuss? It is a car with cameras and wifi driving down public streets taking a snapshot of time. It is one of the coolest projects mankind has ever done. We can go anywhere in the world without leaving our desks. The information is very useful. Why are governments getting in the way of this? It is a fantastic and useful tool.

Re:I don't get it.

[CraftyJack]

The information is very useful.

Useful is an interesting word.
Let's play a game. Pick a theme: Your choices are "naughty" or "nice". Now list as many uses as you can.

Jack Sparrow

[Anonymous Coward]

Good for Germany! I have more confidence in the German Goverment that in Google.

So...

[gaderael]

...Who's going to keep an eye on Germany when the data is in their hands? I'd rather Google have it than the government.

Re:So...

[Bengie]

Exactly.

#1. Google has no real power, so even *if* they did find out something about someone, they couldn't really do anything
#2. A bunch of engineers with large amounts of data love to find out statistics and have no real care about the individual data points
#3. Because of #1 and #2, Google has no real reason to care about the actual personal data, if anything, they collected and would only care about useful statistics
#4. The government likes to dictate what people can and can't do and loves to "look busy" by making useless laws and enforcing them.

Why would anyone want a government to have that data..

Not to mention a crap ton of mac-address is about useless other than....OPEN WIFI IS ILLIGAL IN GERMANY. yeah.. lets hand all that data over so the government can head out and start "enforcing" their wifi rules on all of those open APs.

Data-collection rule 101

[Bearhouse]

I used to think that grabbing & keeping 'everything' was good.
But these days I advise my clients to not collect and/or store more data than they absolutely need, and/or are authorised to do.
This is as dumb as merchants and others (illegally) holding your bank or credit-card data.
Google wants 'maps / streetview' to localise you more precisely if you have not GPS by linking your location to a Wifi SSID as well as just the cell towers?
Great, good idea. Not evil.
But why the heck do they need to collect the network traffic and not just the SSID and Lat & Long?
They don't....

By my count

[Anonymous Coward]

Germany is currently 2 up on Google in the 'starting world wars' category.

Re:By my count

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, Google can't win everywhere, can they?

reading between the lines

[Jodka]

summary says:

"Google says they've offered to just destroy the data, in cooperation with national regulators, but the German government wants to know what they've collected."

Ya, that's what the German government says. But more probably:

"Google says they've offered to just destroy the data, in cooperation with national regulators, but the German government wants what they've collected."

Re:reading between the lines

[maxwell demon]

Surely that must be the reason why they only want one hard drive ...

Let them have it...

[Amphetam1ne]

...but abstract it from any locational or identifying data. Wrap it up in a bow and let them waste their time wading through it.

It is as could be expected...

[bradbury]

The Gestapo was never eliminated it just reinvented itself as the German Government. While one can argue that Google was fairly stupid to collect the data in the first place (why create a potential liability since we know that the "powers that be", not just in Germany, always want more information). What was Google hoping to do with the data -- market locations of open WiFi spots? First of all the *information* is "public" -- anyone citizen is free to collect it (if they want to drive around a fleet of vans with the appropriate receivers). Second of all I believe several countries have criminalized open WiFi hubs (so their days are probably numbered -- most probably because the governments want to climb into bed with the providers to know who is using "anonymous" internet access -- look for them to attempt to compromise any "anonymous" software next).

The only way Google climbs into the equation is that they happen to have collected (concentrated) public data. So they represent an easy target for governments to go after to gain an information source which it might be illegal to obtain (May depend on jurisdiction. In the U.S. spying on ones own citizens is extremely problematic one hopes). Far easier to issue a subpoena for the data from a foreign company than to actually collect the data oneself. I would have no objections if any such data releases were being subjected to a joint oversight commission by the EU and the U.S. to ensure that it was not being subjected to misuse. (The recent ACTA exposures and such agreements as the EU-India Free Trade Agreement which is in part trying to protect the EU from Indian generic drugs suggest that the EU is as "in bed" with corporations as people in the U.S. know is the default reality). One has to ask why would governments seek information from private organizations which they could collect themselves? I at least would ask serious questions regarding why they need or want such information. Perhaps seeking an end-run around issuing subpoenas to all ISPs for citizen browsing habits? And even more importantly a criteria for selecting an ISP -- those whom DO NOT KEEP RECORDS.

Re:It is as could be expected...

[Anonymous Coward]

Just Google Gehlen Organization. It's successor is the BND, an organisation that was until recently filled with ex-Nazis. Those are the people Google should hand data over? Not a very good idea. German intelligence services are the worst of the worst, making mistake after mistake and worst of all getting all of them published in the media (well, it always makes a good read). Not even the CIA has that bad of a track record.

StreetView

[nephosis]

Anyone who ignores just how awesome StreetView is should be considered the real villains in all this.

Re:StreetView

[maxwell demon]

That's as irrelevant to the question of Google recording wifi data as the quality of the music on Sony's CD was to the fact that they put a rootkit on it.

Re:StreetView

[nephosis]

That's as irrelevant to the question of Google recording wifi data as the quality of the music on Sony's CD was to the fact that they put a rootkit on it.

That is quite a good analogy. However, I don't think Sony could claim that the rootkit was an "accident". Still, a good point you have.

What happened to magnets?

[cyberzephyr]

Did anyone realize that the data could be destroyed by magnetizing the drives and re- aligning the iron?

Just a thought.

Mods are horrible in here

[Anonymous Coward]

Seriously, how is that flamebait ? Mods are out of control in here.

Re:Mods are horrible in here

[Anonymous Coward]

True dat.

I can enter your home

[thetoadwarrior]

That's not strictly true. Squatter's rights exist and, at least in the UK, if there is no forced entry it's not criminal.

If you read up on trespassing laws you'll see that simply being on someone's property or even in their home is not a crime. If you do things like leave your door open all the time and I lay a catalogue inside your home then I probably won't get in trouble especially if you have a mail slot on your door which I couldn't use since the door was open. I could even be found further in your house claiming I thought something was wrong as the door was open and assumed a crime took place. Good Samaritan laws can override your right to keep me out. In fact you can physically break into someone's house if there was a just reason. For instance I found you bleeding on your door step.

Most people don't have a right to be in your home and if they're found doing something questionable or with your property in their hands then yes they're screwed and yes entering open windows is generally, without a doubt, considered wrong but the fact is people can enter your property, especially if you leave it open and it's not automatically a crime or even a civil penalty.

Re:I can enter your home

[BobMcD]

You're describing one of the more useful features of selective enforcement. Chances are, in a lot of those example cases above, you did actually 'automatically commit a crime', but they're going to overlook it based on the discretion they're afforded as enforcement officers. It happens all the time, and on the whole, it happens because we designed it that way.

Re:I can enter your home

[zuperduperman]

> You're describing one of the more useful features of selective enforcement

No. Of course this varies enormously across different jurisdictions, but most places actually do have Good Samaritan laws that are a defense *against* other laws even when they are selectively enforced.

eg: if I stop at a traffic accident and try to help an injured person and actually accidentally kill them in doing so, when prosecuted for manslaughter I can cite these good samaritan laws in my defense in court.

Google should comply...

[kpainter]

provided the German government destroy the drives by burning them in a furnace. Everybody makes a mistake once in a while, huh?

This data is useful and it is not personal

[morgauxo]

This is just SSIDs and MAC Addresses right? I'm sorry but if you believe that your SSID and/or MAC address are private, personal information then you don't really understand what WiFi is or how it works. If having your SSID makes it easier for someone to do anything negative to you, steal your bandwidth, spy on actual personal information, etc... then you didn't configure your router correctly. The only thing this information is useful for is estimating where you are when either your device does not include GPS or for one reason or another you cannot receive a decent GPS signal.

Beating up Google for using a record of MAC addresses and SSIDs to bring better location data to map software is counterproductive and Luddite. Anyone who agrees with Germany on this should turn in their geek card and their router. If Google is forced to stop this in Germany then I guess I don't care because I live, work and drive a long way from Germany. If well meaning but ignorant people take up this cause and cause Google to lose this data in the US then I am going to be pissed.

Re:This data is useful and it is not personal

[morgauxo]

Woops, should have RTFA first, thought this was like previous articles where SSIDs and MAC addresses where the sole issue. I still don't care as it still says un-secured networks and that is a risk one takes if they chose not to secure their networks. I also don't care if people were just ignorant about it because they chose to use technology but not try to understand it.

Mod everyone else -1 Redundant

[Requiem18th]

No seriously, how many people came here just to post that same silly "if you are broadcasting your data..." argument?

Slashdot should always allow you to moderate someone redundant (with heavy metamoderation) or allow people to mod themselves redundant, maybe a system to offer another poster all your child posts if you realize you are just repeating the same things.

--

Aaaaaaany way, I don't think the government should have access to such info precisely for the same reason I don't want Google to have it and in fact, part of my complain against Google's data mining is that it enables governments to outsource fascism.

My policy is that, anything you don't want your government to do, or you don't want them to do without a warrant, you don't want a corporation to do freely either.

The "broadcasting your data..." is silly for reasons I won't get into in this post.

Can't we just have one "safe" color?

[kybur]

I mean, if 2.4Ghz has all these laws protecting us against observation, how about some laws that cover 660Thz. I want to be able to project information in blue and know that it's illegal for others to look at it.

Re:Germany giving orders

[Hognoxious]

You're obviously a German historian.

Seen on a brass plaque in Berlin "On this spot, between 1939 and 1945, nothing at all happened".

DUH!

[Anonymous Coward]

Whadda buncha boneheads. The point of getting the data is to prove that Google has violated the privacy laws so that they can prosecute them. DUH! They don't care if you were surfing pron.

Destroying evidence

[khchung]

Normally, when a person wants to delete some data when said data is connected to a suspected case of violation of the law, it is called "destroying evidence".

E.g. You are accused of corporate espionage and police suspect your USB drive contains stolen company trade secrets. Is it ok for you to offer to wipe the USB drive but refuse to hand the drive over to police? No way.

But now when it comes to Google, destroying evidence is now regarded by some /.ers as "protecting our privacy"?! Even when those evidence is exactly for proving how Google violated EU privacy laws?!?! *head explodes*

poltiics, history, and commercial interests

[yyxx]

In Germany, every mobile phone, Internet connection and other communications device needs to be registered with the government, under your real name and address; without it, you can't use those devices. The German government tried to get companies to record all connection information and store it for a period of six months. Even broadcast receivers require a license. And if you want to communicate across your property lines even with a WiFi access point, you need a license for that too. Receiving transmissions without a license can land you in jail for two years. For the German government to complain about privacy violations because Google recorded publicly broadcast packets is a joke. Germany is a police state when it comes to communications, with laws and regulations on the books that would cause massive protests in other nations.

It is also far from clear whether Google has actually broken any laws. In order to violate the German telecommunications law, the communication being recorded actually needs to be a telecommunications message as defined by the law. It is doubtful that unencrypted WiFi transmissions from unlicensed equipment meet that standard. Furthermore, any provider of telecommunications services is themselves legally responsible for safeguarding transmissions with cryptography. So, unencrypted WiFi broadcasts can't fall under the telecommunications laws. And German courts just handed down the decision that you effectively are not allowed to run open WiFi access points at all because they enable copyright violations.

Contributing to this uproar is that the right wing populist German government is tapping into widespread latent anti-Americanism in Germany. We' re not talking about foaming-at-the-mouth, burning-US-presidents-in-effigy anti-Americanism, but Germans are largely convinced that America has one of the worst governments in the world and that Germany is a shining beacon of democracy and human rights to the rest of the world. You could hear the same kind of rhetoric in the 1920's and 1930's in Germany, and in East Germany until that state failed. And the people indoctrinated with, and spreading those ideas didn't just disappear from the face of the earth, and neither did the people supporting them (and both the Third Reich and the DDR had considerable popular support).

German politicians and corporate interests love taking advantage of this. Instead of addressing the serious data protection shortcomings and invasions of privacy in the German government, politicians find it much easier to spread FUD about Google. And because German telecommunications companies have spied on their employees and misused data and are complicit in the recording of communications by the government, they love the idea of deflecting scrutiny from themselves.

Recording unencrypted packets broadcast over public airwaves should be legal anywhere. It probably is legal in Germany. Google should take a principled stand, tell German "privacy" regulators to go take a hike and take this to the German supreme court if need be. Or maybe Google should just leave Germany altogether, like they did in China, for pretty much the same reason: unwarranted and unacceptable government interference in communications.

As for Germans themselves: start learning something about the world outside your borders, start learning something about your own history, and start showing some humility in light of your own history. And start realizing that good democracy is more like a GM car than a Mercedes: good democracy is not a perfectly oiled luxury vehicle, it's messy, inconvenient, and barely gets you to where you want to go.

Re:poltiics, history, and commercial interests

[Aldric]

Recent events with the Greek deficit crisis have shown that Germany is once again getting restless. I would expect over the next few years to see Germany both attempt to transfer EU powers from Brussels to Berlin in the cause of "efficiency" and demand member states to turn over more and more sovereign powers to the EU. Britain will be targeted specifically - one of the first major demands will be to turn over independent nuclear deterrents, with France providing an example for the rest.

The reason they scan for wi-fi signals

[Whuffo]

Google has been building a database of wireless access point / physical location pairs for quite a while. This is how Google Maps on cell phones and such can find its current location - if a wi-fi access point is in range it can look it up and find the physical location. iPhones and their ilk also find their current location in the same way; Apple builds their database when you sync up to iTunes. Since you gave Apple your address when you registered your iThingie - all it has to do is look for an access point when it's syncing the iThingie and add that pair to the database.

These location schemes aren't perfect but they do provide "location aware" services to devices that don't include a GPS receiver - or allow even more accuracy when a GPS receiver is present. I've always wondered if doing this secretly and not letting people know what they were doing and why was a little creepy - but maybe it makes more sense now. If you're scanning for wi-fi access point identification you just might be violating some broadly written anti-hacking law.

very bad analogy

[batistuta]

Sorry, but your analogy doesn't cut it.

I give you an analogy of what Google is doing: some mailman is going around all houses distributing mail as usual. That's his job and that's all he says that he does when people inside a building ask him "who are you?". Now the mailman knows that sometimes people have "interesting conversations" inside their apartments. So as the mailman drops post under your door, he also puts his ear on each apartment's door for 30 seconds and if he hears something cool, he records it. Then he logs all these conversations and uses them for his own profit, maybe selling it, making statistics about where people argue more or tend to have more sex, or whatever. This is what Google is doing, and it is not right. In Europe it is also illegal. Period.

Now going in the direction of common sense: not everyone knows how to secure a network. Some people pay an "expert" to install their routers and they still get it set it up in unsecured mode. Are you still gonna blame those owners for not knowing this? Don't defend Google's actions by blaming unskilled users who all they want is easy access to internet.

GeoLocation Isnt so wrong...

[Life2Death]

My assumption is that they are mapping out locations like Coffee shops and what not so joe blow can find it and head over there from search listings. Also great for devices without gps, it gives a better fix than Cell towers that are thousands of feet off.

No, They Didn't Fine Anyone

[andersh]

Foolish, foolish anonymous coward. The German case you refer to was not about "fines" imposed by the government.

In fact it was clearly not a fine, but a liability for the expenses the complainant had issuing the cease-and-decist letter (Abmahnung). The money goes to the complaining party as compensation, the government received nothing. See where you went wrong?

The Germans even have a law clearly limiting the amount the complaining party may demand in compensation to 100 Euro. This is a pittance compared with the actual cost of hiring a lawyer and the Germans simply wanted to stop the creation of an "industry"of cease-and-decist letters issued to everyone with a BitTorrent client.

The case is very interesting in fact, the judge was very reasonable and only clarified the responsibilities private users have (turn on encryption, change the default password). The person in question was not guilty of copyright infringement and no damages were awarded.

European Union Law and Members

[andersh]

It has a lot to do with the unique nature of the supranational, non-Federal nature of the European Union.

Each nation still retains sovereignty and national justice systems, EU directives have to be implemented within existing national frameworks.

To quote the EU:
"EU directives lay down certain end results that must be achieved in every Member State. National authorities have to adapt their laws to meet these goals, but are free to decide how to do so. Directives may concern one or more Member States, or all of them".

Each nation's police and government will act according to local custom and law. A nation can be more proactive and might interpret the actions of Google in conflict with local laws, while others don't.

Not Correct

[andersh]

Sorry, but you have totally misunderstood the case. There was no law against Open Wifi, in fact there was no fine or damages involved.

However due to the copyright infringement that did occur on the user's network he was liable for the [capped] lawyer fees involved in sending him the cease-and-decist letter.

The law in question actually stops copyright holders from demanding damages and limits this kind of cases to a maximum of 100 Euros in compensation [to the complainant].

The judge stated that users have a responsibility under German law to secure their networks, simply turning on encryption and changing the default password, based upon the existing legal situation.

Even if the user fails to secure it, properly or not, he could not be held liable for damages.

"Wer folglich ein nach diesen Kritierien unzureichend gesichertes oder gar gänzlich offenes WLAN betreibt, kann künftig für jede Urheberrechtsverletzung auf Unterlassung in Anspruch genommen werden, die über den Anschluss begangen worden ist. Allerdings dürften nunmehr die zu erstattenden Abmahnkosten auf 100 Euro beschränkt sein, außerdem muss kein Schadensersatz an den Rechteinhaber geleistet werden."

http://www.focus.de/digital/computer/bundesgerichtshof-wlan-betreiber-muessen-ihr-netz-schuetzen_aid_507474.html

http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/BGH-schraenkt-Folgen-der-Stoererhaftung-fuer-WLAN-Betreiber-ein-998591.html

voyeurism anyone?

[greenjelly]

I disagree. The correct analogy is this: It is stupid of someone to change their clothes with their window curtains open - but that does not give the right to any passerby to take photos of it and keep it. I think most slashdotters are nerds who think anyone who does not understand wireless security is not worthy of owning a computer. Look at it from the other side.