EU targets Google on privacy, market dominance

EU data protection authorities have urged US internet search giant Google to shorten the period it stores images from its controversial Street View web service because of privacy concerns.

Launched in San Francisco in 2007, Street View allows users to navigate around a 360-degree view of city streets, buildings, traffic and people, using pictures taken by Google's camera vehicles.

Now available in many countries, critics of the service accuse Google of failing to obscure sensitive images and setting its cameras in a way that allows them to peer over fences, hedges and walls into private property.

Google, which now keeps the images for a year should halve this period, privacy authorities wrote in a letter to the company's global counsel, Peter Fleischer.

"The Working Party believes that a maximum retention of six months for the unblurred copies of the images would strike the right balance between the protection of privacy and the ability to eliminate false positives," the letter, which has a February 11 dateline, said. The Working Party, which is made up of privacy supervisors from European Union countries, advises the European Commission on data protection rules.

European Justice Commissioner Viviane Reding said she would monitor data protection issues closely.

"In Europe, we have high standards for data protection. I expect that all companies play according to the rules of the game," she said in a statement.

In the meantime European Union antitrust regulators are looking into complaints filed by three online companies against Google that may lead to a formal investigation into the search-engine giant's business practices.

The European Commission, tasked with ensuring that companies do not abuse any dominant position in the 27-country EU, can fine firms up to 10 per cent of their revenues for violations.

It has to date imposed billions of euros in fines against Intel and Microsoft for abuse of market dominance.

"The Commission can confirm that it has received three complaints against Google which it is examining. The Commission has not opened a formal investigation for the time being," the EU executive said in a statement.

It did not identify the companies.

World No.1 search engine Google said earlier that British price comparison site Foundem and French legal search engine ejustice.fr had alleged that its search algorithm demoted their sites in web search results because they were rivals.

It said Microsoft-owned Ciao from Bing had complained about its standard terms and conditions.

Google said it had done nothing wrong and was confident it would not face a formal investigation.

"This is the beginning of an enquiry, in all likelihood it will not go anywhere. The Commission has not expressed any hint of guilt," Google senior competition counsel Julia Holtz told reporters on a conference call.

Google had 90 per cent of the global search market compared with 7.4 per cent for a combined Yahoo and Bing, according to November data from web research firm StatCounter. It has drawn increasing regulatory scrutiny as it has grown.

US antitrust authorities have challenged Google's settlement with book publishers and authors groups to create an online digital archive, and are seeking more information on the competitive impact of its proposed $750 million purchase of mobile advertising company AdMob.