Google Street View Ignores “No Trespassing” Signs

Google has received flack for quite some time now for their Street View cameras snapping pictures of private property without the owners’ approval. In a suit between Google and a Pittsburgh couple in April of this year, Google claimed the right to enter and photograph private roads with their camera-equipped Street View vans, largely due to the availability of satellite images.

The company has a policy of staying off private roads, and using local drives who know the surrounding area whenever possible. However, despite the fact that a Humboldt County resident says she had two “no trespassing” and 1,200 feet of private road separating her home from the nearest public road, Google photographed her property.

Though Google offers a link to submit questionable material to a queue for censoring or deletion, the process is totally up to the company’s inclination and free from any governing body. And even though they have a public policy of avoiding private roads, an unnamed Google van driver confessed that he was told simply to “drive around,” which supports the reason why so many other instances were captured on camera.