Why Google Maps blurring would set us back
Editor's note: This guest post by Drexel University researcher Keith Sevcik is in response to statements made by California assemblyman Joel Anderson in a Q&A conducted earlier this week with CNET News.
California Assemblyman Joel Anderson wants to censor Google Earth and other satellite mapping services from providing detailed images of sensitive areas.
Under the guise of preventing terrorist attacks, the bill seeks to blur satellite imagery of government buildings, medical facilities, schools, and places of worship to remove "air duct"-level detail from the images. If Mr. Anderson's claim--that only "bad people" want to know that level of detail--is true, then count me among them.
I am a robotics researcher at the Drexel Autonomous Systems Lab (DASL) in Philadelphia. At DASL, we develop flying robots and ground vehicles to help emergency responders in disaster recovery and search and rescue.
One of the biggest challenges facing urban rescue robots is navigating city streets, and flying in and around buildings. Satellite images and pictures of buildings were once hard to come by. We often used street maps or low-resolution terrain maps to plot the path of our robots.
With these maps, you could easily tell that your robot was driving through the parking lot behind the school. However, they don't show the street lamp in the robot's way or the telephone wires it's about to fly into. Google Earth and similar programs put these tools at our fingertips, allowing us to focus on building and programming robots.
Without a doubt, these services have advanced the field. Publicly available images are used in computer simulations to make realistic-looking buildings and pinpoint a robot's location. Robotic planes can match onboard camera views to satellite images, showing the extent of damage to a disaster area. Robotic helicopters use them to test window-tracking algorithms in realistic environments.
These are a few of the many applications that have aided in cleanup after hurricane Katrina, fighting wildfires, and building the world's first autonomous cars.
By saying "there are no other uses for knowing on a map where there are air shafts," Mr. Anderson simply ignores the widespread use of these technologies by academia. Enacting this bill would effectively set robotics research back 10 years--to times before realistic photos were readily available. In trying to prevent terrorism, he is actually preventing the advance of search-and-rescue technology.
Keith Sevcik is a researcher in mechanical engineering and mechanics at Drexel University in Philadelphia. At the Drexel Autonomous Systems Lab, he specializes in robotics research. He co-wrote a July 2008 study for the Journal of Intelligent and Robotic Systems called, "Testing Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Missions in a Scaled Environment." 
Certainly parking lots at these sensitive locations might be blurred. We wouldn't know until the argument happened after this law was passed. There would still be plenty of public places, public parks, retail locations, etc. where you would have that level of detail.
I would also think that as the bill is moved forward and edited a process could be put in place for researchers through background check and secure data access agreement to gain access to a service with the unblurred photos. Since this bill is still in committee and you have a reasonable use for the data the first question should be "can my needs and the purpose of the bill both be fulfilled"? If they can then systems that allow for it should be worked into the bill. If they can't then you should begin talking about stopping the bill.
I am generally for open information everywhere, but the fact is that satellite information was reserved for government use for so long for a reason. As long as no one starts talking about blanket blurring of the detail in google earth then I'm willing to have the conversation about how to meet security needs and realize the most potential from this product. I would hope everyone else would be willing to have that conversation as well.
Blotting out areas of maps makes the maps less useful for all of us. It's as simple as that.
This is yet another case of a law that would punish the vast majority of us while not doing a single thing to make life more difficult for the poster child it's being proposed for.
It's already taking thousands of workers to rectify those satellite images into a coordinate system. The satellites don't just snap a picture and magically know where on earth they are. They have to be projected to a known coordinate system. Computers don't do that automatically. Also, even for a small city there are many images that are taken that have to be rectified, it's not just one image.
How do you think the terrain shows up on Google Earth? Stereography is used to get relative elevations, then they have to be projected to a geoid model. Computers don't do that automatically.
My point is that there are already thousands of people working to provide that data, so blurring certain areas is not near as costly as you make it out to be.
Meanwhile, should the Empire State building be blurred because it has a school in it, but then be un-blurred if the school moves out?
This law is well-intended, but needs serious re-thinking. The result of the law would be that the default for every area would be to blur it. Google could then selectively un-blur a few park areas, once it had proven that there were no places of worship nor schools nor medical facilities in them. Beyond that, I doubt that even Google would have deep enough pockets to risk the lawsuits if it unblurred anything else. After all, how would Google know for sure that a farmer had not built a house of worship in an obscure corner of his farm?
Let's say this passes (I can't hope enough that it doesn't, but hypothetically ...). Let's say I'm a terrorist (that's "turrist" to retardicans). I want to cause as much pain and suffering as I can and I have a rough plan, but I need images to plan out the details and of course a target. Fire up Google Earth and look for blurred images - obvious target. Use Google Earth to plan out how to stake out the target - public places are still unblurred so I have the perfect opportunity to decide which building I want to take pictures or video from - which building is tall enough? I'd want north, south, east and west images of the target, how can I get those easily from surrounding buildings without drawing attention ...
OK you say, let's just ban Google Earth entirely (or better yet, just blur all images so it's useless). Fine, now I use a helicopter, or small private plane, or public transportation to explore your city and take my own pictures the old school way. So let's ban those too, helicopters, airplanes, public transportation and all cameras (still and video). But now I can just sketch my observations, so we also need to ban paper and writing implements like pencils and pens. But I can still observe and communicate, so what's next - eyes, ears and vocal cord bans?
Why don't we just cloak everything so it can't be seen by anyone. Would that make us safe enough?
See why retardicans are retardicans now? Instead of trying to solve the symptom by hiding everything, why don't we start trying to address the problem itself. Why are terrorists terrorizing people, why are they so angry?
I missed your point because you lost credibility with the name calling; it's not an effective or rational way to participate in a discussion.
Google does not create the photos, they just put them online. High resolution photos are created by airplane flyovers (not satellites) that take thousands of pictures which are then painstakingly stitched together and rectified to the curve of the earth by teams of GIS specialists. They're performed by hundreds of government and private industry organizations all over.
As vidanuevatx says, where do you draw the line. The problem with these types of things is it sets a precedent that we can't easily turn back from. Then people are demanding blurring of more things. Recently there was a study that proved that terrorists do not use the internet all that much to plan attacks. People need to realize it and stop witchhunting. Cutting off the tools that terrorists use isn't going to work as they are just going to find tools elsewhere. We need to go after the terrorists themselves.
Freedom comes at a great cost and carries many risks. It's time that we were the home of the brave once again.
Tremorfireheart@yahoo.com
when maps are outlawed, only outlaws will have maps.
the terrorists win when we act from fear, and not reason.
And a helicopter sight-seeing trip is what, $100?
This information has already been available...in higher resolution...with more details...for decades...for public consumption. You just had to visit your local Tax Office to get the Aerial Photography they do for Tax Mapping and/or GIS. Today, most municipalities have moved this information online for even easier access.
BY LAW, all of this information is public domain. I can go and look up your house, how much you paid for it, how much it is worth, even see a floorplan for the house. The problem is most people do not know this is available, but Google Earth makes it very public.
What public use of Google Maps and Google Earth implies is that to sanitize them means Google has to get out of the public safety business unless they fork. Period.
Since we pay for these services and the public doesn't, what's the right choice? Ad revenues are shrinking and Google is making up for that by increasing costs to paying
customers. If they lose them, they take a very hard hit, Mr. Google Stockholder.
So who wins this one, Mr Assemblyman?
They attacked the World Trade Center. The Pentagon. The Alfred P. Murrah building. Harrod's in London.
Big, splashy targets with lots of civilians.
This is the policy of the last eight years: indulge in a passion for secrecy, restriction, and lack of access, and use terrorism to justify it.
I've got a better idea: use Google Earth to actually find Osama bin Laden, rather than keep him around to use as a boogeyman to scare people.
Being able to see fences, dog houses, trees and shrubs, walk ways, etc. are all things that will make it not only easier but faster for him to do his work. So, if Google Earth has to blur schools and other buildings because the MIGHT be targets are some point in the future then I should be able to blur my property if I so wish.
Maybe what should happen is if a building or facility it target and bombed, etc. then they should be able to request that it be blurred. I think you should have to prove that having it visible from Google Earth means it will happen again since it has already happened once. Otherwise suck it up.
As for things like air conditioners, etc. being visible well then don't put them on the roof. If you don't want something to be seen then don't leave it out in the open.
Robert
- by whois101 March 13, 2009 9:40 AM PDT
- Yet another kneejerk bill. While I agree that blurring of military areas could be beneficial, and even for the key buildings in Washington, I disagree that schools, hospitals and places of worship should be blurred. That's such an overreaction beyond believe. It's treating the whole US like a war zone, by a politician that's apparently intimidated by technology, or trying to score points by some populist actions for a special interest group. Let's go back to the stone age and rule out things like radio, tv, and computers while we're at it. What's the point?
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