Street View catches Finn with his pants down
The Finnish authorities have launched an enquiry into what they consider a serious breach of privacy on Street View, after a snooping spymobile captured a chap wearing less clothes than is advisable when Google comes a-calling. The trail begins at this house, at Maakaarentie 14, in Raahe. Behind that wooden fence is someone who' …
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Total disrespect of privacy
And by weird co-incidident, Google is building a huge serverfarm here in Finland.
When they have property here, they are in serious trouble if (and quite obviously when) they are found guilty.
Taking photographs from other people in their homes (or yards) is a serious offense here and Google not bothering to check pictures while taking those is yet another example of Googles all-pervasive arrogance and disrespect of privacy of others.
They are even worse than MS nowadays and that's _bad_.
indecent exposure
Now I am not up to date on Finnish laws but isn't it illegal to be stripping naked in the front yard of your house where anyone on the street can see you?
Everyone has a right to privacy but equally we have a right not to see what he is selling.
Beer, I drink to forget.
@oliver 8
repeat after me...
The googlespycam is not at average eye level it is on top of bloody big pole on the top of a car.
what you can see from up there is not what you see walking down the road.
when you pick your hedge or fence for your garden you don't think "I wonder how tall it needs to be in case a man walks down the street"....
No it isn't
He's clearly behind a fence. Presumably it's tall enough that passer's-by can't normally see in. Google's streetview camera is mounted much higher than eye-level (I checked the view of my own neighborhood to confirm this). I admit I'm no expert on Finnish law either, but in the US the general rule is that you have an expectation of privacy if you can't be seen by a person on the sidewalk.
Anyone from the street can't see you
You might have noticed that there's a fence in front of the yard, in most countries these are used to guard against people seeing you from the street.
As you have noticed, they do not guard against a camera mounted on top of a tripod mounted on the top of a car.
Nor should they need to.
Dick
Big Brother IS watching you, and oliver 8 seems to think there are no issues with this. Oliver, please take some photos of your garden and while you are at it why not innovate / give google a new product idea and also take some photos inside your house, and then upload them all for us to see. Just please don't take your pants down, you might be breaking the law, even in your own house...especially now that we can see in to your house we would be offended and we'd call the police and have you arrested.
WTF is this world coming to??!!
Ten foot pole
legal or not -- and I know as little about finnish law as you, I reckon that if the only way you can be seen is with a camera mounted on top of a ten foot pole, you are taking as much care to be private as anyone ever needs to....
-- Peeping Tom
Overexposed
If you look at the pictures, there is actually a fence between the garden and the road. The problem which I see is that the cameras on the google pervcars are positioned considerably higher than most peoples' eye-level. They got into trouble for this same thing in Japan, and had to re-shoot large amounts with the cameras at a reduced height, so as not to peek over peoples' walls.
No way
Unless Finnish laws are totally screwed up, he has a reasonable expectation of privacy on account of being behind a reasonably tall fence. Raising a camera into the air and taking pictures across said fence would then be invasion of privacy and probably not a smart thing to do.
Height of the average Finn?
Oliver 8,
I think you're failing to consider the presence of the fence in the photo, and the height at which the camera is mounted on the Googlecar.
This bloke was on his own property and not visible to passers-by.
He should be OK.
quite possibly not...
I am not up to speed on Finnish law either, but there are actually some countries in the world that do not follow the US/Saudi "arrest everyone for being naked under their clothes" approach to the human body.
It's not completely beyond the realms of possibility that in Finland one might be able to walk around naked on one's own property without having the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice stormtroopers kicking down the door.
Double deckers
Do they have double decker buses in Finland? Or very tall photographers?
erm,
I might regret asking this, but what was he doing?
my guess is ...
he was just about to, or had just finished, cracking one off.
Looks like
he's about to crack one off, judging by his position.
Catching sun
The best suggestion so far was from my colleague, who figured the guy probably has psoriasis and was getting some light treatment for his skin problem. There seem to be pink patches on his shins to support that theory.
It would also explain why he'd be half naked in what I assume was cold weather. It's probably early spring time in the pictures as there are no leaves in the birch trees and there are some patches of snow further down the road, and the bright cloudless sky suggests it was barely above freezing.
If that's the case I feel very sorry for him.
Cheap
In the US, the guy would ask for millions and millions of dollars...
Unintentional?
Are we really supposed to believe that he wasn't out there intentionally, just to catch Google with both his and their pants down?
If he's for real, I'd say he's By My Lady lucky they didn't catch him with his hand in his, ahem, lap.
Are there no children in the neighboring flats that could come running around the fence and catch him en flagrante?
Perhaps that's why the police paid him a visit? Because I can't imagine the police around here being bothered to pay someone a visit for something like this.
Google = Evil
actually they would be obligated to do so. A crime has been commited against that man, and he has the right to make a criminal complaint against google. If they shop and posted naked pics of you, wouldn't you?
Ah, yes, many's the time I've had to yell at the neighbours
for peeping on my trying to to tan my cock
Strong bladder
He might have been taking a piss.
Making a bit of a game of it, from where that buckets positioned.
Additionally
Additionally, no matter WHY he was sitting in his back yard with his pants down, the fact that a road goes right behind his house and across the field is an apartment complex shows he had no expectation of privacy. If he were inside with eh blinds closed, expectation of privacy. Sitting on a swing pantless in your back ground with no privacy fence AND in clear view of a public street equals no expectation of privacy.
So some chap taking a walk sees him and snaps a pic. That is not a violation of privacy. Putting such pic on-line, while a bit rude, is not illegal either. Does it matter of it's a car with a camera on top rather than a pedestrian and compact digicam?
Dick 2
Of course it matters, the camera was hoisted so high it can see over the wall.
If some passerby propped a ladder against the fence, climbed up for a nosey peek, and a police car was passing by at the time, you know they would have words to say to him, may be worse.
So what gives Google the right to do it? No right really, but dicks who think that Google is cool and can do no evil obviously do not have a clue, neither do they value freedom and privacy and are more than happy to be caught on CCTV 300 times a day in the UK.
Try again
"h 6", snapping a pic *is* a violation of privacy and illegal. Perhaps you should read up on Finnish law before spouting your idiocy.
Just because the Brits (or the Americans) don't value their privacy enough to enforce it in any way doesn't mean that the rest of the world is required to follow your example.
the googlecam car
has the camera mounted higher than average eye-level by a good foot or so. So it's more like someone walking past his fence with a camera *on a stick*
Obviously he thought he was in a private area.
After all he was behind a 6 or 7 foot wall/windbreak thing.
Bad google - no cookie.
ttfn
Hey!
I have a swing just like that in my backyard!
Except it's creme-colored...
Free decorations
As opposed to his which is green with brown stripes?
Steve... since he's a brown stripe as well. I will never forget what you did to my IIc+ Steve.
getting ready...
I think he was just getting ready for a mid-afternoon tryst with that sessy looking table.
Looks like somebody
..has prepared early for using "flash" at his iPad.
Geeps
What's it come to when a bloke can't top up his vitamin D levels in the seclusion of his own back yard?
now the suit is due...
i would give serious monopoly money for the prosecutors to start the proceedings with
"members of the jury, we wish to defend your right, should you so wish...to hang out...with your wang out.........."
or...
"....or indeed, if you'd prefer, to rock out.....with your cock out...."
Answers on a Postcard please
What I want to know is: What the hell is he doing? Taking a dump on his outdoor furniture? Will someone please enlighten me.
Re own backyard
What makes you think that this is his backyard?
Where's the Paris angle?
Otherwise I think that's quite enough about the one-eyed Google snake!
Tanning the todger
And why not ?
Though I do note that the fences between the houses don't stretch all the way to the substantial frontage fencing obviously designed to keep prying eyes out. That could be more than bargained for by a neighbour who pops round to blag a cuppa.
It's interesting to see the authorities' reaction - Get caught doing the same in Blighty and it's probably a sex register offence.
Obviously, Scandinavians and Street-View do not mix
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=rugdeveien+39+bergen&sll=59.913801,10.73882&sspn=0.000449,0.001635&ie=UTF8&hq=&hnear=Rugdeveien+39,+5097+Bergen,+Hordaland,+Norway&t=h&layer=c&ll=60.360883,5.369267&spn=0.000824,0.002261&z=19&cbll=60.360884,5.369468&panoid=vIlVwLm8kDoxekaRJ0MwdQ&cbp=12,286.53,,0,14.63
I don't know what this is but I love it
I think it's obvious
The flood waters receded much faster than they expected.
That......
Was reported in the Register the other day, highly amusing :-)
Google goolie's with the new street porn
I have to laugh as you know some poor sod will now have to teach some automated censoring software a aspect of visual imagery that will prove to be some colourful work for the software testers in Google goolie land. Still more proof of Global Cooling^h^h^h^h^h^h^h Warming^h^h^h^h^h^h^h Change^h^h^h^h^h^h Shift; So google can be forgiven for being human.
In further news "I semi-naked man is seen in `Europe`", Oh what a revelation that must be outside Europe :).
Second view now disabled
Seems someone in the MVCF reads El Reg...
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