Google & Wardriving

Google have hit the headlines again, as various regulatory bodies reopen investigations into their "wardriving" and illegal collection of WiFi data whilst they where using the Street View cars  http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-18415856. It is now coming out that the engineer who wrote the code told others http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-17892288 some reports have named Marius Milner author of NetStumbler http://www.crn.com.au/News/299072,netstumbler-creator-behind-google-wi-fi-snoop.aspx as being the engineer involved. The NetStumber site is not making comments on the allegation http://www.netstumbler.com/2012/05/07/is-marius-milner-the-unnamed-google-engineer/

The Street View project was an ambitious plan to photograph and map the world’s streets that also involved gathering information about local wireless networks to improve location-based searches. A Google engineer went a step further, and included code to collect unencrypted data sent from homes by computers as specially equipped cars drove by. Google has long maintained that the engineer was solely responsible for this aspect of the project. But a complete version of the F.C.C.’s report, released by Google on Saturday, has cast doubt on that explanation, saying that the engineer informed at least one superior and that seven engineers who worked on the code were all in a position to know what was going on. The F.C.C. report also had Engineer Doe spelling out his intentions quite clearly in his initial proposal. Managers of the Street View project said they never read it. Mr. Milner created a program called “NetStumbler,” the page also says, and describes the early version of NetStumbler as “the world’s first usable ‘Wardriving’ application for Windows.” The F.C.C. report notes that wardriving is “the practice of driving streets and using equipment to locate wireless local-area networks using Wi-Fi, such as wireless hot spots at coffee shops and home wireless networks.” To design Street View’s code for locating wireless hot spots, the F.C.C. report states, “Google tapped Engineer Doe.”

Engineer Doe wrote the code during the 20 percent of work time that the company gives employees to pursue ideas on their own according to Google. In 2010, after it became clear that Google’s Street View project was collecting e-mail and other personal data, Google hired a computer investigations firm, Stroz Friedberg, to examine how the software program worked. The outside investigator’s report was named, “Source code analysis of gstumbler,” http://static.googleusercontent.com/external_content/untrusted_dlcp/www.google.com/en//googleblogs/pdfs/friedberg_sourcecode_analysis_060910.pdf  the name for the Street View application initially used inside Google. The Stroz Friedberg report does not name the developer of the gstumbler program, or other engineers who worked on Street View.

Locating and communicating effectively with Wi-Fi networks is an essential capability for mobile computing. It is an important tool in smartphone software like Google’s Android, Apple’s iOS and Microsoft’s Windows Phone, both for communicating and often for location-based services like shopping guides and Foursquare.  Data beamed from wireless networks guide those location services. But, according to industry executives and analysts, there are different approaches to using Wi-Fi transmissions. The minimal approach, they say, is to collect data on the access point and strength of the signal. A Google rival in location software, Skyhook Wireless, takes the minimal approach, said Ted Morgan, chief executive, while Google does not.

This is going to go for a bit longer in the press.