Routine image caught by Google street-view.

Maybe it’s because Germany has a history of an intruding state, or maybe it’s because they have common sense, but thousands of citizens have demanded that internet monopolist Google remove their homes from the street-view system.[1]

The “service” that allows anybody online to view virtually anywhere on the map down to the street level, like one massive surveillance camera, will be fully launched in 20 German cities by November, but even the conservative minister for consumer affairs, Ilse Aigner, has requested to be excluded.[2]

The EU justice commissioner Viviane Reding spelled it out quite clearly: “Every citizen holds under EU law the right of appeal against Google Street View. I expect that Google respect European rules on data protection – anywhere in Europe. The best way is a citizen friendly and non-bureaucratic tool for appeals.”

As a reactionary measure, rather than good business practice, Google, who is a corporate member of the nefarious Council on Foreign Relations, have now declared that concerned members of the public can opt out of the scheme, but they have the gall to close that option midnight on 15th September.

Of course there’s nothing stopping citizens taking the giant corporation to court, but that would probably prove more hassle and cost than it’s worth, and thus the corporate dictatorship creeps ahead.

It was only in May that authorities discovered Google vehicles were collecting private data sent over wi-fi networks.

“The independent audit of the Google system shows that the system used for the wi-fi collection intentionally separated out unencrypted content (payload data) of communications and systematically wrote this data to hard drives. This is equivalent to placing a hard tap and a digital recorder onto a phone wire without consent or authorisation.”[3] Google said the incident was a mistake. Whooops we just got caught mass wiretapping, my bad.

Germany has a right to be concerned and a right to demand removal from the system at ANY time. As does anybody else in any other country. But it’s not just your average privacy issue. Google has a history that is inexplicably tied to intelligence gathering.

As reported by Infowars.com:
The CIA admitted that they helped to bankroll Google from its inception. Robert David Steele, a 20-year Marine Corps infantry and intelligence officer and a former clandestine services case officer with the CIA named Dr. Rick Steinheiser as the CIA’s contact with the company.

According to Homeland Security Today:
[Google] cooperates with US intelligence agencies to provide national and homeland security-related user information from its vast databases. The CIA’s Office of Research and Development “has been giving them additional money and guidance and requirements.”

Last November, the CIA – through In-Q-Tel (the venture capital firm set up by the CIA to “identify and invest in companies developing cutting-edge information technologies that serve United States national security interests”) – issued notices to sell $2.2 million worth of Google stock.

In was further reported earlier this year by the Washington Post that the National Security Agency would be enlisting Google to help with issues of Cyber-Security.

If you see one of these cars that work for Google, maybe go over and ask the driver if he knows he’s working for the CIA and NSA on a mass surveillance operation.