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A
multistate investigation is raising more questions about
how
Google Inc.
gathered people's private information through their
unsecured wireless networks while collecting data for
its popular Street View feature.
Connecticut
Attorney General
Richard Blumenthal
, who has been leading the monthlong investigation, sent
a third set of questions to
Google
on Wednesday asking whether it had tested the feature's
software before putting it to use. Doing so, he said,
should have uncovered any glitches responsible for the
unwarranted collection of e-mails, passwords and other
personal data of those who failed to protect their
networks with passwords.
"
Google's
responses continue to generate more questions than they
answer," Blumenthal said in a statement. "Now
the question is how it may have used — and secured —
all this private information."
Blumenthal,
who is running for Sen.
Christopher J. Dodd's
seat, also said attorneys general from 37 states and the
District of Columbia
have officially joined the probe, including those from
Texas
,
Florida
and
Massachusetts
. Eight states would not be identified because their
laws bar them from disclosing investigations, he said.
A
spokeswoman for
California
Attorney General
Jerry Brown
said that although the attorney general's office has
been talking directly with
Google
over the issue, it has not joined the multistate probe.
"As
we've said before, it was a mistake for us to include
code in our software that collected payload data, but we
believe we did nothing illegal,"
Google
of
Mountain View, Calif.
, said in a statement. "We're continuing to work
with the relevant authorities to answer their questions
and concerns."
The
investigation, which follows similar probes in
Germany
and
Australia
, is also considering whether federal and state laws
need to be changed or updated as a preventive measure.
The
Street View function, which launched in 2007 and
expanded to most major cities in the U.S,
Europe
,
Africa
,
Asia
and
Australia
, uses vehicles to photograph street layouts to give Web
users a 360-degree view of streets and roadways.
But the
vehicles were also equipped to detect Wi-Fi access
points, which
Google
hadn't disclosed until recently. Although the purpose of
using the access points was to help computers figure out
where they are without having to use a GPS system,
Google
said it also mistakenly picked up 600 gigabytes of data
from unsecured networks over the last three years.
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