22 June 2010 | Author: J. Cave SEO Consultant

Google could face prosecution over Street View privacy breach

An early look into the Google vs. most of Europe inquiry has revealed that Google managed to get its hands on sensitive information such as passwords, as its Street View cars trawled through the UK.

France has already started its investigation, which has been carried out by French data protection agency CNIL. The results of the investigation will determine whether or not France decides to prosecute Google for gathering the sensitive data.

As previously reported, Street View cars surreptitiously collected payload data at Wi-Fi hotspots, which Google logged into in an attempt to develop its location-based services.

Like many other data protection agencies throughout Europe, CNIL asked Google to hand over the data. The agency will then try to determine whether or not any privacy laws have been breached.

According to IDG, a first glance at the data reveals that CNIL has found a number of passwords for e-mail services as well as text messages.

Speaking on behalf of CNIL, chairman Alex Turk said he hoped they would have a decision by September over whether or not Google would be charged with breach of privacy laws. Depending on the outcome, it's possible that Google could be given a fine or a warning - however, if it believes a criminal charge is necessary, the case will be passed onto a prosecutor.

Meanwhile, Google is said to be working with other international agencies to try to get the issue sorted. Google boss Eric Schmidt has tried to justify the error, saying there was "no harm, no foul" in collecting the data. It was simply an error which they are doing their best to sort out.