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Google's Mapping Contest Draws Ire From Indian Government
hypnosec writes with news that India's Central Bureau of Investigation has ordered a preliminary enquiry (PE) against Google for violating Indian laws by mapping sensitive areas and defence installations in the country. As per the PE, registered on the basis of a complaint made by the Surveyor General of India's office to the Union Home Ministry, Google has been accused of organizing a mapping competition dubbed 'Mapathon' in February-March 2013 without taking prior permission from Survey of India, country's official mapping agency. The mapping competition required citizens to map their neighbourhoods, especially details related to hospitals and restaurants. The Survey of India (SoI), alarmed by the event, asked the company to share its event details. While going through the details the watchdog found that there were several coordinates having details of sensitive defence installations which are out of the public domain."
"You didn't get a permit from us about writing a map, so we will ask you to share the map with us."
There are no national secrets anymore. This is fucking retarded. Anybody with a satellite can see anything they don't want you to see, AND MORE. India is more of a third world shit hole every day, which is saying something.
Someone didn't get his bribe!
Doesn't the Indian government have better things to do? Oh like feeding their hundred of millions of impoverished citizens or even building toilets so they don't shit outside everywhere. Or even solve the massive corruption they have.
No wonder India is such a shithole of a country.
Piss off India and your labor supply will come to an end!
"The company[Google], noting that it was not aware of any privacy issues, ..."
It little behooves the best of us to comment on the rest of us.
Make india a grea area on google maps
You can't really censor that from the internet, now can you?
I get mad when people map out my fences too.
They mapped out "De-fences".
out of the public domain
If you can see it from public property and tell what it is, it's (effectively) in the public domain, isn't it?
If it's supposed to be secret, and someone who shouldn't know where it is does, you've got a security leak.
I'd say Google's doing them a favour. If any of their secret installations turn up on it, you know it's time to shut them down or move them.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
Exactly. If it was crowdsourced, then by definition, it is in the public domain. It's public domain information they want to cover up. Not 'information not in the public domain'.
It's not like US with the satellite have seen WMD's in Iraq, or are they seeing WMD's which never exist?
They started a contest with all the usual disclaimers, etc...
The people entering the contest are the ones that need to validate that what they are submitting is legal or not.
This is a non story, unless you count inept Indian government officials... Though that's not really news either.
when a OSM vs google maps flamewar starts?
Title says it all.
If US govt can censor sensitive areas in USA, why can't Indian govt do?
If you can see it from public property and tell what it is, it's (effectively) in the public domain, isn't it?
Not necessarily. This isn't the United States. Different laws and customs applied differently. Your normal expectations regarding the law may not apply.
I'd say Google's doing them a favour. If any of their secret installations turn up on it, you know it's time to shut them down or move them.
Yeah... I'm sure that's exactly how they will see it too... [/sarcasm]
So now anything that Google greys out will be highlighted as an interesting area to investigate.
Illegal numbers strike again!
It is precisely this sort of bureaucracy, where people protect their jobs above all else, that prevents India from being a competitive, global economic power.
They can... And I think they should... Put a big red polygon there with the label "Indian Government Declared Sensitive Area" right on top.
This is a sig. This is only a sig. Had this been an actual sig you would have been informed where to tune for more sigs.
Haters gonna hate
Have you never heard of the Streisand Effect?
In C++, your friends can see your privates.
seriously, "defence", doesn't every freakin' browser have a spell checker built in nowadays ?!
I like Indians (I'm Brazilian btw, so it's not self-praise).
One of the best authors I've read in my life was an Indian, Rabindranath Tagore (though I just know him by the story "Kabuliwala" and a poem which was the basis for that beautiful song in the "Where the hell is Matt?" videos).
Their music is great -- look up "Vande Mataram" (the "Raagapella" a cappella version is a nice arrangement).
For all the rape stories that abound now (I hope they can solve that shameful situation ASAP), there are a lot of beautiful stories like this one (*):
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/12/04/school-under-bridge-in-ne_n_2233019.html
I'd like to see more Bollywood films, some are interesting, like this one: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taare_Zameen_Par
I once read about an Indian Politician (already deceased) whose life story was based on the "pay forward" idea.
Plus, Mother Theresa, chose there to live. I think we should at least follow her example and pay more attention to the poor in India.
Even if they stink now. Because they can be better. They'll get a lot of Nobel prizes, if we don't stand in their way.
(*) No links, use Firefox, select and drag to the tab bar.
India just needs to construct a giant tarp over their country to protect it from spies (the side benefit is now they can sell access to sunlight to the populace).
When I lived in the UK, there was a big blank space on the official maps just outside town. Anyone who lived near there knew it was the local nuclear weapons dump, and any Soviet spy who drove past would see the buildings that mysteriously didn't appear on the map, and know it must be something important enough to hide, and therefore important enough to bomb in wartime.
The whole thing was just stupid.
Have you never heard of the Streisand Effect?
The Streisand Effect works only if you know and care about Barbara Streisand --- and only in a time and place where Geek Rules override every other consideration.
The geek has a one-size-fits-all cultural mindset that has never served him particularly well.
Also the border is disputed with Pakistan and China. Since Pakistan has been the "ally" of USA since 1950s, and India kept dallying with USSR all those days, almost all the American magazines will carry maps that show disputed parts of Kashmir as part of Pakistan. I have seen so many Reader's Digest, Time, National Geographic, Life mags with maps of Kashmir region stamped with, "This map does not agree with the official map published by the Surveyor General of India. No significance may be attached to the differences published here. " (quoting from memory, actual wording could be even more bureaucratese ).
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
well if they are so sensitive, maybe the citizenry shouldn't know about them.
Just a heads up: Beta doesn't show italics correctly. Classic is ok.
Allah owns your ass! Our generation will witness the miracle of every American and every American child in every American classroom kneel before the Men of Muhammad! If you're uncovered whores refuse our commands, they will be put to death like dogs!
Slashdot never disappoints. It's full of frustrated little white boys worried about losing their coding jobs and pakistani terrorists, ready to throw shit.
Stay classy, slashdot.
It could also have something to do with the fact that normally foreigners are not allowed in cantonments and other restricted areas and so the use of locals opens both sides up to problems.
My visa specifically mentions which cities I can live in (so I must register with the FRRO in either of those cities; as far as I know, I don't think I can just up and move from say Delhi or Mumbai to somewhere else without getting some additional permitting or a replacement visa first) but it also says "not valid for prohibited / restricted and cantonment areas" meaning I can't even visit those places without getting permission first (which could be a pain in the ass if someone were to actually check my documents as I move around, because sometimes the only way to get from A to B is through such an area).
So apart from the replies concerning bribery (probably a factor), the government may simply be annoyed that Google is recruiting Indians to do stuff for a foreign entity which involves "areas of interest", which is fair enough I suppose - if said foreign entity were a government, wouldn't that basically amount to spying?
Founder & COO, Hayai India (hayai.in) / USA (hayaibroadband.com)