Google has added street-level views of Los Angeles and other cities to its popular mapping service, the Los Angeles Times reports, raising a chorus of privacy concerns that echoes objections to the feature elsewhere. Though a useful navigation tool, Street View "is a visual reminder of how our private spaces are really shrinking," one privacy advocate says.
Google stresses that the images are legal, but there's no denying that more people can eyeball sunbathers if a photo of them winds up on Street View. Although the company removes images it receives complaints about, the pictures may have been reposted elsewhere, making no adult-bookstore patron or sidewalk nose-picker safe from ridicule. (More Google stories.)