Google angers Indian policy makers over "Mapathon"
Summary: Google's attempt at crowd sourcing location information in India is being investigated.
Back in February of this year Google India introduced a campaign to crowd source mapping data in India. The competition was called Mapathon 2013 and asked contributors to use Google Map Maker to point out locations in their neighborhoods. The top contributors would be eligible to win Android tablet PCs, phones etc. Unfortunately for Google, an intelligent idea has taken a wrong turn with the company being investigated by the Delhi police for breaching the country's security.
In a complaint lodged by Survey of India, a government body in charge of mapping & surveys, they claim that the competition is illegal. One of their concerns is that some of the information uploaded by the users might be sensitive (a fair concern). According to the police department, the complaint has been received and has been forwarded to the cybercrime division to look into it.
What makes matters worse for Google is a strongly worded letter by Member of Parliament Tarun Vijay. The letter addressed to the Home and Defense ministers has Tarun Vijay calling out Google for skirting the laws and jeopardising India's security. According to parts of the letter obtained by Indo-Asian News Service, Tarun Vijay says,
[Google has shown] utmost disrespect for the Indian mapping laws. Google has become habitual of offending Indian sensitivities, and previously also it was found uploading positions of Indian warships, showing Jammu and Kashmir in Pakistan territory and also Arunachal under China
He further implored the Defense & Home ministers to look into the matter "keep the sanctity and supremacy of the Indian law intact."
While Google has been in the midst of a free-speech-on-the-Internet debate, the mapping issue is unrelated. This isn't the first time Google's mapping initiatives in India have run into legal troubles with the government. Back in 2011, Google had to halt their StreetView initiatives in Bangalore due to legal concerns raised by the city's police force. Back then, the media outlets claimed it to be a policy confusion and Google being a victim. This time however, the concerns raised seem to be genuine. While Google might have their intentions in the right place, all Google Maps users might not have the same peaceful intentions.
Somehow Google just can't seem to get a break with Indian law.
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Talkback
Kick the thief out of the country like the Chinese did...
Screw you!!!
But for this? I only want to say screw you!!! Do you know anything about Chinese, about Chinese government, about how people in China feel?
Chinese gov kicks off Google because Chinese gov wants to block all information(most political related) that it doesn't want to people knows which Google strongly disagrees.
As a Chinese, we suffer a lot - I don't want to say too much about political because it's unsafe to say anything against the gov.
For us, Google is a hero which doesn't obey the willing of the evil.
Profanity aside, this article is about India..
And Hero? Really? What you seem to imply is that Google is there in China "because not being there would hurt Chinese human rights and the Giant Pandas would stop eating." What Chinese junk are you smoking? It's a for-profit company just like any other.
Same old Google
Being the eight hundred pound gorilla in the room should mean that you are More careful when you move, not less. "Don't be evil." That's a joke. If they keep this up they will be worse than Facebook.
Well...
It seems you have more knowledge about Indian culture.
Actually...no
Re: illegal to take photographs and/ or recordings of any kind of certain p
Perhaps it would be useful for such a list to be uploaded to Google maps.
HAHAHAHAHA!!!
Only by a paternalistic government...
It seems you have a lot more information about India
Re: Could you please care to share.
Your ignorance makes me cry
Re: voluntarily sharing this information with the public
Are you trying to be stupid?
Re: Are you trying to be stupid?
?
What laws where actually violated, and can you link a .gov site that has the ACTUAL text of said law that was violated?
When you link to "a complaint lodged by Survey of India" can you link to the ACTUAL Complaint lodged by Survey of Inda instead of some other news site that dosn't say anything different or have any text of said complaint.
If your going to report the news, report it. if your going to put links in your article to other refernces, cite something of value & not some circular referenced bull shit.
lrn to
I'm a little confused
It also occurs to me that I may have some illegal photos of New Delhi (and elsewhere) in my portfolio. I mean, they were taken outdoors and many contain public buildings.
I'm a little confused
Sanctity of Indian law?
Calling Indian law "holy and supreme" is a bit too close to a religious argument against what Google does. It just shows that it is not just the Muslim and Christian followers that can be a bit "touchy" about their sacred places.
Making public information public is a crime?