UK tells Google to remove private data or face court

Britain’s data regulator says Google must delete all personal data it has gathered using its Street View project or face court action by the watchdog.
The Information Commissioner’s Office (IOC) has given Google Inc. an enforcement notice demanding that the company remove the data it had offered to delete back in 2010.

“Google has…confirmed that it still has in its possession a small portion of…data collected by our Street View vehicles in the UK,” Peter Fleischer, Google’s global privacy counsel … Google apologizes for this error,” Peter Fleischer, Google’s global privacy counsel, wrote in a letter released by the IOC in April 2012.

The revelation was not welcomed by IOC as it had signed an agreement with Google in November 2010, based on which the firm had to remove all Street View data on Britain-based residents.

The data were collected by vehicles taking Google map images as they used local Wi-Fi outlets to place exactly place the properties so that the Goggle map software could make sense of the pictures.

The privacy watchdog has now given the company 35 days to kill the material or face criminal offense for contempt of court.