Google's Street View Starts Blacking Out Parts of the U.K.

I find this somewhat humorous because London has tons of surveillance cameras all around the city, but since the launch of Google's Street View in the U.K., dozens of photos have been removed after privacy complaints (and for other reasons, like one of a man relieving himself on a street).

Street View images can be removed via a simple process, as I've indicated before, by bringing up Street View Help, click a link, and select "This image infringes on my privacy," or any of a few other reasons (see above).

And that's apparently what's happening. According to a Google spokesperson, the number of removal requests has reached the "hundreds," but it had been "less than expected."

"We take privacy very seriously which is why when we announced Street View for the UK we explained our easy to use removals process for images people found inappropriate - simply click to report a concern and report the image."

One such image which was removed is above: a man exiting a sex shop. His face is blurred, but still. Google says its software automatically blurs '99.9 per cent' of faces and car number plates.

The British cities on Street View are Aberdeen, Belfast, Birmingham, Bradford, Bristol, Cambridge, Cardiff, Coventry, Derby, Dundee, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Leeds, Liverpool, London, Manchester, Newcastle, Norwich, Nottingham, Oxford, Scunthorpe, Sheffield, Southampton, Swansea and York.

Google's Street View Launches in the U.K., the Netherlands

Is it time to start a pool on how long it takes for the first privacy lawsuit against Google to be filed in the U.K.? Why? Because Google's Street View has launched in 25 cities.

Street View is a feature of Google Maps and Google Earth, and provides a 360° horizontal and 290° ground level view.

Here is the list of U.K. cities covered by the new U.K. Street View service: London, Edinburgh, Leeds, Bradford, Cambridge, Cardiff, Belfast, Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool, Oxford, Sheffield, Nottingham, Derby, Bristol, Coventry, Glasgow, Aberdeen, Swansea, York, Newcastle, Dundee, Southampton, Norwich and Scunthorpe.

Also launching on Thursday was a version in The Netherlands; the number of countries covered is now nine.

Street View was already in other parts of Europe (France, Italy, Spain) as well as Japan, Australia and New Zealand.

Google's Street View launched in 2007, and has been the source of privacy concerns and lawsuits. It's even been banned from entering some townships. It's also been banned from U.S. military bases, and been the source of both humor and angst.

But it's also been used to foil a kidnapping.

Additionally, Google will remove images from the service if requested (see that little "Report a Concern link in the embedded map above?).

So, as it continues to roll out, what do you readers think? Cool toy, useful navigation tool, or privacy risk?