Minnesota town tells Google Maps to get lost

This is as far as Google Maps Street View will take you in North Oaks, Minn., before it politely takes a right turn.

(Credit: Google)

A small town in Minnesota has told Google that its Street View feature can hit the road.

North Oaks, a private community of 4,500 residents north of St. Paul, isn't too keen on outsiders traipsing through its privately owned streets--even if is only on the Internet. According to the city's Web site, the roads are privately owned, and a no-trespassing sign greets potential visitors to the city.

So city officials were really unhappy when images of their streets and homes appeared on the Google Maps Street View feature, which presents a view of dozens of United States cities from a driver's perspective.

The North Oaks City Council sent the Internet search giant a letter in January demanding that images be removed or risk being cited for trespassing, the Minneapolis Star Tribune reported.

"It's not the hoity-toity folks trying to figure out how to keep the world away," Mayor Thomas Watson told the newspaper. "They really didn't have any authorization to go on private property."

The company removed the images shortly thereafter, a Google representative told the newspaper.

"This is very rare, where an entire town would request to be taken off," Google spokeswoman Elaine Filadelfo told the paper, adding that the company removes images when individuals make the request.

Google is no stranger to complaints about its Street View service. Not long after the feature launched in May 2007, privacy advocates criticized Google for displaying photographs that included people's faces and car license plates. In May, the company announced that it had begun testing face-blurring technology for the service.

In April, a Pittsburgh couple sued Google over photographs of their home that appeared on the company's site, saying Google should honor a private road sign on their street. It claims that Google's "reckless conduct" has "exposed plaintiff's private information to the public."

For those who weren't exactly comfortable with ordinary photos of their property appearing on the Net, get ready to reveal a little more. A couple of weeks ago, Google confirmed that it is gathering 3D data, along with the photographs it takes for its online Street View service.

[JCPayne]

Fair enough. But I hope their roads and so on are never paid for by public funding.....

[JCPayne]

Fair enough.
But I hope their roads and so on are never paid for with/by public (Federal) funding..... They sound like another one of Warren Jeff's Mormon Later Day Saints style ranches.....

[groink_hi]

BS logic. Google is a privately held and traded company. Google does not receive government or other public funding either.

[jeffboyd]

Warren Jeffs is not Mormon.

[R.Jefferson]

[R.Jefferson]

CNET needs to fix its comment sections. In addition to having 20 different ones where you have to register 20 different times, most every article has double posters and I couldnt see the comments on this article until I posted one of my own.

A unified commenting system is in order here.

[BTJustice]

GET OFF OF MY YARD!!!

[jwhitbread]

My girlfriends son was shot and killed in Hollywood in Sept 2007. Google Street View shows him walking down the street with a friend. She cherishes the photos.

[The_Decider]

That is nice and I am sorry for her loss, but how is that relevant?

[ewelch]

The town has no legal standing to insist such a nonsensical idea. Any view from the streets, which are public, is fair game.

Ever hear of the First Amendment? Case law shows that this topic is the same as when dealing with the press. You cannot prevent anyone taking photos from a public place, because anyone who is visible to that photographer has no reasonable expectation of privacy. (That is the legal definition.)

It would never pass constitutional muster, and any attorney who takes on Google is a fool.

[atmx2000]

You apparently didn't read the article. The roads are privately owned. The property boundaries of houses extend to the middle of the road. Therefore there are no public places at street level to take pictures from

[Jacketty]

Reread the article, it clearly states that the roads are privately owned. That is like your driveway is privately owned and should be respected as such.

[groink_hi]

Re-read the article. This town is similar to a gated community - only without the gate. Consider the no trespassing sign as a virtual gate of sorts. Sure, you can take photos of the entrance (as you can see in the main article.) but futher photos of the town requires entrance onto their private roads.

[amg55nj]

The town does have a legal standing and Google had no right to take those photographs because if you reread the article, it states that the roads are private. This means that the residents own the roads and they are entirely funded and maintained by residents. This means a non resident must have permission to drive or walk onto their streets. The streets are not public in North Oaks and therefore not publicly funded.

Looking at the town's website, all the town's needs are contracted out which is how it should be. Only pay for services you need and not have to pay for services you don't want as we all do through taxes. We have many roads here that are private but I have never seen an entire town that is private. Interesting idea and the way it should be.

[Cricker12]

Actually the Google photographer had no right to DRIVE on the streets without permission, but if they were allowed to drive on them they had every right to take photos.
"the way it should be"? If every town was that way, you couldn't leave where you lived without first getting written permission from every jurisdiction you intended to cross - but of course the post office would be shut down also.. Travel and commerce would come to a halt, people would starve, and the economy would collapse. Public rights of way are as old as the human race, and for good reason.
Gated communities are a horrible idea that should be legally banned.
And of course Google could avoid the problem by taking their photos from 501 feet in the air, which is public airspace. Privacy rights are more threatened by governments which are increasingly using arial photos to find zoning violators, etc., and traffic cameras.

[Lerianis]

I have to agree with Cricker12 about gated communities. They are a TERRIBLE idea that lead to some very bad abuses in this world, like women, men and children being held captive by various people.
Secondly, there shouldn't be any such thing as 'no trespassing'. Frankly, you have the right to go anywhere you want in this world, and no one should be allowed to stop you unless you are actually going DIRECTLY into their home.

[MTGrizzly]

First, kudos for kicking Google out of some place they don't belong. Google has gone from "do no evil" to one of the largest threats to privacy in the first decade of the 21st century.

Second, there was a reasonable expectation of privacy since the streets were not paid for by the public and are owned by individuals. The no trespassing signs create an even greater expectation of privacy. Google realizes this, so they take down images when people complain...

There is a history of "private" communities in this country. Look on the web for the City of Ocean Grove in New Jersey. Ocean Grove, founded as a religious community and completely privately owned, used to close its gates on Sunday and not allow any cars on the streets. (Ocean Grove, over time, as it became secularized, changed its practices and stopped closing the gates on Sundays). The Yellowstone Club, a community in Gallatin County, Montana, excludes everyone who is not a member or their guest. Gated communities, because cities and counties can't afford to pay for infrastructure, are more and more common. In many of these communities, the infrastructure is built and maintained with private funds. Unless the developers cede the title to this infrastructure to the government, here is no right to pass in these incidences.

Google, like everyone else, needs to respect the law and the privacy it gives to residents. As it is, Google will go anywhere they desire, laws and commonsense be damned. It's time to make Google respect others' privacy...

[Renegade Knight]

Yes and No.
Private infrastructure has to meet public standards. That imposes certain public obligations.

[toumei64]

The way I see it: So if it's such a big issue, what are you trying to hide?
It's not like they're showing something I can't just drive over and see...

[The_Decider]

Actually, you can't without risk of getting charged with trespassing. This is private property. Are people incapable of reading?

[fuzzyCWD]

yes, it IS like they are showing something you cannot just drive over and see. reread. PRIVATE ROADS all throughout the town.

[gregj777]

Just another bunch of rick folks who think their you know what doesn't stink and think they're entitled to everything. Just like the ones in Washington. It doesn't get any clearer. And like the other poster said, what are they trying to hide? Do they cover their license plates as they drive down the road out of "privacy"? Idiots.

[The_Decider]

Yeah, how dare they demand that a company obey property laws! You do realize their is a rather large distinction between private and public property don't you?

[fuzzyCWD]

in THAT case, i assume you wouldn't mind if i came and looking into your window? or are tyou trying to "hice something"?

[drukenhard]

Do you even need to register a car if it's driven on private property?

[Wyoming 1973]

I grew up in this community and I you must have nothing else to do we work hard for our money and we appreciate the peace. it used to be a gated community. We pay to have our roads maintained. We have are own police and we aren't trying to hide a dam thing there must be jealousy.

[gerrrg]

amg55nj, their private community can only exist because they still maintain connection to the outside world. If the outside world was not so modernized with roads, their privately-contracted services would be for naught, and they would never be able to buy things or build things as they currently have. Do they not have a need for world-class medicine outside of their borders? Do they not want to ensure that their neighbors directly outside of their city limits do not produce noxious fumes that fall into their private little city? All these require connections to the outside world.

[The_Decider]

How is that relevant?

With your insane logic your bedroom is public.

[i_am_still_wade]

PRIVATE roads mean privately maintained roads, and NOT private property. Big big difference.

[fuzzyCWD]

but you miss the point. the point is that it is a privately OWNED community, not a "true city" per se.

[amg55nj]

gerrrg, I have no problem with connections to the outside world. Their community does have connections to the outside world as they contract out for police, fire, medical services, etc. I'm saying that this is the way it should be. Why should I have to pay for education and public schools through taxes if I have no children and no use for these services. People should pay for their children to go to school like they do for private schools. When I go to a store, I pay for things I want and I pay one set price that others pay as well. I do not pay for everything in the store I don't need or want and the price doesn't go up for me because I make more money. For example, I want to buy a shirt. The shirt costs me $50 and it costs the same for someone else. It doesn't cost me $100 while it costs someone making less money $25. This is how taxes work. We all get the same services but because some people make more, they pay more. Ridiculous. Privatization leads to better results and proper maintenance. Look at public housing. We should all thank god that we have the right to buy our own homes. And to i_am_still_wade: Private roads does mean privately maintained roads as you stated but it also means PRIVATE PROPERTY. No one other than residents and their invited guests are allowed on those roads. Think of it as a driveway shared by your neighbors or a parking lot for a bank or other business. Its private property but customers of the banks (invited guests) are allowed.

[The_Decider]

"Why should I have to pay for education and public schools through taxes if I have no children and no use for these services. "

Because you do benefit from schools. With your attitude our country would be much further down the drain then it already is.

[gerrrg]

I'd like to point out that I can get great bird's eye aerial views of an olympic-sized pool at the end of Southpointe Ct. just north of the baseball fields, that are just north of CR96, in the private community of North Oaks, MN. Thanks, Microsoft! :D

[techforward]

Google has gone way too far in invading the privacy of individuals; and our laws were not written with these types of technologies in mind. If you believe, privacy is not important; then why don't you simply post your name, work title, salary, marital stautus (this is pubilc information anyway), your tax contibutions at the fed, state and local level; the number of children you have, the terms of your divorce (if you are divorced - this is public information too.) . If you really believe that privacy is unimportant - then you'll post this information for everyone to see.

The fact is that while some of this personal information is actually available to the public, no one expected it would available so easily and widespread. And there are individuals who might use this information in 'less than honorable' ways.

Would you want your childrens pictures and interests easily accessible to anyone who has a criminal record of child molestation? (http://www.familywatchdog.us) We all have a right to keep our personal information private, and to determine with whom & when we want to share it, and how much we want to disclose.

[gerrrg]

amg55nj, private or not, these people pay for things they don't use. They don't charge homeowners by the call, if you call the police, now do they? Somehow or another, the police are still being paid. If you have an HMO, you pay for other peoples' illness if you've never gotten sick. Johnny might not use the parks in North Oaks, but he still pays to have it maintained. There are lots of things we don't agree with or don't use, that we nonetheless have to pay for...and the last time I remember reading, we have a representative Democracy, not a privatized Democracy. If we got to pick and choose individually what we wanted to pay for and what we didn't want to, the end result of our actions would lead us down a path towards the elimination of communities. Even in North Oaks, they pool their monies together for things that some people use a lot more, while others hardly ever need, if ever use. You must take pride in the entrance and usage fees at our National Parks. By next year, you could be paying $40 to enter some of the more popular sites. But even that amount is not enough to cover the actual costs and to pay for the backlog of repairs. How does $150 to enter a National Park sound like...if we agree to your proposal that only users pay? Who needs a City Council? Why should I pay the City to fly the flag? Why should I pay the State to pave highways that I'll never use?

[gerrrg]

techforward, by the same token, don't you want to know where child molesters live, and whether or not you're living next to an ax murderer? There's balance required when it comes to privacy, as with anything else.
_____
Google's images do not inherently invade your privacy, because in order to cull useful information from the photos, you need additional context. You need to know that Joe Shmoe lives at a specific address in order to determine that he's got an olympic-sized pool that he never properly received a building permit for. Or that Joe Shmoe was lying when in divorce filings, he said he was broke, even though you can clearly see his new 2,000 sf addition on his home, which again, wasn't properly permitted.
____
If certain information wasn't public, you'd never be able to determine whether or not you were paying too much for your house, or that house you were looking at buying had the proper permits going forward, for which you'd be legally responsible for. And you wouldn't be able to verify if that lovely fiance of yours wasn't lying when he/she said that he/she was never married (or divorced).

[amg55nj]

gerrrg, you just made my point exactly. You shouldn't have to pay the state to pave highways you don't use. All roads should be privatized and you should only pay tolls or fees for ones you use. And you have the option to live in a community like North Oaks. North Oaks seems like a community where you buy into as long as you chip in for community services, like a coop building for example. They have the right to ask you to pay a maintenance fee and if you choose to live there, you should pay it whether or not you use the services. This is also similar to a townhouse development where they make you pay a maintenance fee for lawn services, pool, tennis court, etc. Now I personally wouldn't live there if I didn't use those services but those are their rules and the developer can set those rules. I would just buy my own land and build a house in an area where I didn't need to pay for other services if I chose not to. An area like this does not exist because we all pay for "services" through property taxes. But if all this were privatized then there would be areas where you could pick and choose and each house would be separate and individual.

[amg55nj]

Oh and about the police comment. Yes you are right they don't charge by the call because they have set it up as a monthly fee. Similar to cable tv. You pay a monthly fee not pay everytime you turn it on. If they chose to, they could make it a per call charge as you when you pay Microsoft a fee each time you call their tech support. Its however they want to set it up and what you agree to. And it would not lead to the elimination of communities. In fact, people would form a stronger sense of community. And those who chose not to contribute or participate could also find a place for their privacy. Everyone wins. You are speaking of socialism where everyone should be treated as equals. This is a capitalist society where the harder you work, you are rewarded greater. And people have choice.

[CAStrunk]

Every entrance into North Oaks has a big NO TRESPASSING sign. Even residents from neighboring towns steer clear of the area. These roads are indeed private, and Google needs to respect property rights.