Google exec's home 'exposed'

[hari]

THE US National Legal and Policy Centre (NLPC) has allegedly exposed the home of Google co-founder Larry Page using his company's own mapping services.

Photos of "a top Google executive's address" were posted by the NLPC in response to a current Pennsylvanian court case regarding privacy issues in Google Street View.

Images taken from Google Street View highlighted the licence plates of a Lexus and a Mercedes parked outside the Californian property, while an aerial image measured the distance from the gate to the front door using Google Earth's measurement tool.

The NLPC also mapped a driving route from the house to Google offices nearby, with street-level images of each intersection on the way.

"There is no better evidence that individual privacy simply does not exist in Google's world than by the chilling amount of detailed visual information Google now collects on all of us, information that any internet user can now compile in a dossier in less than 30 minutes," the NLPC said in an accompanying statement.

The name and address of Mr Page, 35, were obscured in the NLPC document, however technology blog Valleywag said the censorship could be removed by an "easy" workaround.

Mr Page has a net worth of $US16.6 billion ($17.85 billion), according to Forbes magazine, which listed him 26th in its 2007 Rich List.

A spokesman for Google Australia refused to comment specifically on the issue, but said Street View has strong privacy safeguards.

"Anyone can flag imagery that they consider sensitive for removal, at the click of a mouse," he said.

"Street View only contains imagery already visible from any public road and is not real-time."

He added that faces and licence plates will not be visible in Street View Australia, which is expected to launch later this year.