Google let off without fine by UK information commisioner
04 Nov 2010
In the UK, the Information Commisioner has ruled that Google was in "significant breach" of data protection laws when its Street View cars "mistakenly" collected people's email addresses and passwords over unsecured WiFi networks.
The internet giant, however, escaped with a promise not to allow it to happen again, without having to pay a fine.
According to information commissioner Christopher Graham Google had broken the law when devices installed on its specialised cars collected the personal data. The company has been told to delete the information as soon as it was legally cleared to so and has ordered an audit of its data protection practices.
In May, Google admitted it had collected "payload data" – information transmitted over a network, at the time users log on and said it was acutely aware it had failed to earn the public's trust with the incident.
In a post published on its official blog on 22 September, Google admitted that "in some instances entire emails and URLs were captured, as well as passwords".
Graham said, "It is my view that the collection of this information was not fair or lawful and constitutes a significant breach of the first principle of the Data Protection Act.
