ICO Unlikely To Re-Probe Google Despite Street View Findings

It is unlikely the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) will re-investigate Google over its Street View data slurping, even in light of fresh findings, a spokesman for the data protection watchdog has told TechWeekEurope.

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) report into the Street View saga, an unredacted version of which was released by Google, showed the engineer who created the Wi-Fi data grabbing code told co-workers about what he was doing. He also divulged to them that he was planning on taking data for use on future Google products. Data taken during the Street View rounds included email content, URLs visited by users as well as passwords.

Further action?

Yet the ICO, which did not fine the tech giant after the initial investigation claiming it did not have the power to issue monetary penalties when Google actually collected the information, has said it is unlikely it will look into the case again. However, it is looking at the FCC’s report before making a firm decision.

“We will study the Federal Communication Commission’s report and consider what further action, if any, needs to be taken,” an ICO spokesperson told TechWeekEurope.

“Google provided us with a formal undertaking in November 2010 about their future conduct, following their failure in relation to the collection of Wi-Fi data by their Street View cars. This included a provision for the ICO to audit Google’s privacy practices. The audit was published in August 2011 and we will be following up on it in June to ensure our recommendations have been put in place.”

The “Engineer Doe” has now been identified by the New York Times and it has become clear he was known to be a dab hand at creating “wardriving” code that could pick up data whilst in a moving vehicle. He produced the wardriving software in the 20 percent of time Google gives its employees to work on whatever they like.

The Google worker told other engineers and at least one senior manager about what he was doing, but more senior management were not informed, according to the tech giant.

Privacy campaigners have reportedly called for a re-opening of the investigation into Google in the UK. In the US, Google received a fine of $25,000 but the FCC said the company had not done anything illegal.

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