Home ministry sees red in Google Street View, puts a stop

Fears of street-level images compromising national security believed to be the reason

As a result of a perceived threat to India's security, the Union home ministry has rejected Google's plans to include cities, tourist spots, hills and rivers in an application in which one can explore them through 360-degree, panoramic and street-level imagery.

The security establishment got wary of allowing such image-capturing, given that planning for the 2008 terrorist attacks in Mumbai is believed to have involved photographic reconnaissance of targets by Pakistani-American David Coleman Headley.

Official sources said the rejection came after a detailed analysis by security agencies and defence forces, which feel allowing Google to cover India would compromise the country's security.

Minister of State for Home Kiren Rijiju said once the proposed Geospatial Information Regulation Bill, 2016, comes into force, issues related to internet-based applications would be resolved.

Google wanted to cover most of the Indian territory through Street View.

It explores places around the world through 360-degree, panoramic and street-level 3D imagery.

Everything taken under it is posted online.

Street View is a technology featured in Google Maps and Google Earth, and it displays panoramas of stitched images.

Street View has been extensively used in the United States, Canada and many European countries. Its applications in India were initially permitted for a few location.

Google had on an experimental basis launched Street View in some tourist sites like the Taj Mahal, Red Fort, Qutub Minar, Varanasi river bank, Nalanda University, Mysuru Palace, Thanjavur temple and the M Chinnaswamy cricket stadium in Bengaluru, in partnership with the Archaeological Survey of India. The application was launched in 2007 in several cities in the US and has since expanded to include cities and rural areas worldwide.

Streets with Street View imagery available are shown as blue lines on Google Maps.

Most photography is done by car, some by trekkers, tricycles, and walkers.