




Google Pulls Map Images At Pentagon's Request 217
Stony Stevenson alerts us to a little mixup in which a Google Street View crew requested and was granted access to a US military base. Images from inside the base (which was not identified in press reports) showed up online, and the Pentagon requested that they be pulled. Google complied within 24 hours. The military has now issued a blanket order to deny such photography requests in the future; for its part Google says the filming crew should never have asked.
I'm trying to discover... (Score:5, Insightful)
Do we think there should be street level maps inside military installations on Google Street View?
Whether someone "screwed up" in the meantime, at Google, the installation, or both, is beside the point of whether the imagery should be removed.
The issue of how/why the crew was granted access, whether it was a gated or "open" installation, etc., are all unanswered.
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Re:I'm trying to discover... (Score:4, Informative)
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Better yet, take a picture of your house yourself, and then copyright that image. When Goog
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I'm trying to discover how or why this is a bad thing
Are you serious? Really? You're trying to discover why having street level view of military bases is a bad thing? Or you're trying to discover why having Google pull it is a bad thing? Either way, the situation and post seem to be fairly evident to me.
The asshat that said "Sure Google, film our military installation all you'd like..." is bad.
Pulling it from google is not bad.
I'm pretty sure that's what you meant. I don't think the poster was trying to imply that google pulling it was a bad thi
Re:I'm trying to discover... (Score:5, Insightful)
And yes, I agree this is noteworthy, but the tone of the article is likely to be interpreted by many here as somehow negative; i.e., that a private company is "censoring" content at the request of the "government". Other posters have already said, essentially, "What's the big deal? This is all stuff I can see with my own eyes anyway!" Read through the rest of the posts and see for yourself.
Also, it seems very likely this was an ungated, or open, facility (as many large/urban installations are, which then have other levels of restricted access for controlled areas). Google probably formally asked permission to drive around, was granted it, and was allowed to drive around (since in this type of facility they are streets that are effectively accessible to the public). I find it very unlikely that this was a closed/gated/restricted facility that Google was just granted access to simply by asking. In fact, that is almost certainly NOT the case.
Re:I'm trying to discover... (Score:4, Insightful)
Every scandal in the last 7 years has been accompanied by a chorus from the right telling us that public exposure to incompetence (Walter Reed) or malfeasance (billions of dollars lost to contractors in Iraq) or law breaking (torture and warrantless wiretaps) are giving "aid and comfort" to the enemies. But, it is obvious that the real desire for secrecy is not to protect America but to protect the careers and reputations of the people who fucked up in the first place.
Re:I'm trying to discover... (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't disagree that there was likely no "national security" reason to take the images down, but think of the long term strategic possibilities or even personal safety concerns. The Presidio of Monterey, for example is an open base. It's where the Defense Language Institute is and all services send their soldiers/airmen/marines/seamen there to learn languages that typically are then used in Intelligence collection of one form or another. Aside from the personal safety of the individual servicemen and women, think of the long term strategic advantage gained by targeting a particular area there. One school perhaps, that covers a particular asian or middle eastern language. You can hamper intelligence collection significantly by one well placed attack.
Sure, it's highly unlikely that someone would do such a thing, but it's certainly a viable target even though it isn't considered such by most folks. Many "open" bases are similar in that they support an infrastructure that is key to the military but not an obvious target.
I don't disagree that our government has lost its sense of decency with respect to oversight and we should try to take some of that back, but denying world-wide access to potential military targets shouldn't be part of that, in my opinion.
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This... [schneier.com] article explains that we too often fall for protecting ourselves from our fears, when it is actually quite irrational based on the probability of what you've suggested.
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Again, driving directions and advice on getting a visitor pass are not the same thing as detailed information on building and infrastructure locatio
CYA (Score:5, Insightful)
While I agree with that statement, it implies that in non-democracies things should be something other than open.
But your last paragraph is really bad logic. You say that every scandal in the last 7 years of exposure to incompetence, corruption, or illegality has been decried as giving aid and comfort, which is largely true. That's because exposure of bad things does give aid and comfort to our enemies. The argument for exposing them anyway is that it's worth the price. It is incorrect and self-deluding to claim that there is no price to be paid.
But it is not "obvious" that covering for the people who made the mistakes is the real desire for secrecy, since that lumps all three of your categories together. The real desire for secrecy is in fact to hide our inner workings from our foes. Hiding them from ourselves is just a bad side effect that secrecy proponents are willing to accept, while you are not. And it's not the case that all revelations are met with equal cries of disdain from the Right nor glee from the Left. Lumping them all together is useful for creation of a bogeyman, but it's not an accurate picture.
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Re:I'm trying to discover... (Score:5, Insightful)
You acknowledge that secrecy and classification systems have a purpose, but then go on to say that "every scandal" in the last "7 years" (interesting choice of timeframe; poilitical much?) have used secrecy arguments as an excuse. You then seem to make the logical leap that any use of secrecy in the last 7 years has been to cover up corruption (and this has never happened at any other time in US history...?).
Consider this: gathering foreign intelligence outside of the United States on non-US Persons has ALWAYS been allowable without any form of court oversight or warrants. As it should be. Now, there are two issues:
1. Some exclusively foreign traffic between foreign individuals can now travel through equipment located physically in the United States. Why should that be off limits? Indeed, if telecommunications operators are willing to assist, we should absolutely leverage the fact that we have direct access to the traffic.
2. Capturing communications of a foreign individual outside of the US -- even if the other end of the conversation ended on US soil or was a US Person -- is also always allowable without court oversight or warrants (however, the identity and conversation content of the US Person may be masked for legal reasons). Again, since warrants protect individuals, why shouldn't telecommunications operators be allowed to voluntary assist in the interception of such traffic via much, much easier means?
Foreign intelligence is a necessity, even for free nations. It always has been. Any denial of this is the denial of reality. The Constitution only applies to US citizens or persons with a legal status within the United States. It does NOT apply to foreign persons outside of the US; any argument that it does flies in the face of the very notion of nation-states, borders, and international relationships. This is precisely why the surveillance of such persons does not require a warrant. In the past, there was no earthly reason to conduct any such surveillance within the United States. Now there is.
I'm not saying taking such surveillance of non-US Persons within the United States' physical borders isn't rife with controversy, much of it valid. But can you see how it's possible for this to not be so clear cut when you just throw out the blanket statement that it's "illegal"? Can you actually envision a scenario in which the Intelligence Community is trying to aggressively leverage all of the foreign SIGINT capability it possibly can given the circumstances? I know that certain folks can only see this as an obvious plot to destroy the Constitution, strip away civil liberties, and create a police state. However, where I live -- aka, the real world -- this was simply an aggressive attempt to make a lot of foreign intelligence collection, especially when one of the endpoints is in the US, a lot more practical. That doesn't mean it's not controversial.
And Walter Reed [wisc.edu]...I try watching the "exposés" on Walter Reed, and you know what? Kill me for saying this, but water damage on some ceiling tiles and peeling paint? Is that really affecting the level of care? This is what people are up in arms about? Granted, there are a wide variety of other problems with military medical care and facilities, but they're not classified.
This isn't to say that secrecy has never been used to cover up for corruption or illegal behavior. But you're making some sweeping statements and coming to conclusions that aren't warranted. There is a compelling national security interest to not have easy-to-use street level photography of US military installations available globally. Basic principles of operational security and defense in depth would easily validate that. Does that mean some
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What the hell are you doing here?
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What are you saying here? That corruption and covering it up is acceptable in the present day simply because we've had corrupt men in power before?
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Um, no? I'm addressing the curious choice of the timeframe of "the last 7 years", not justifying any occurrences just because it has happened before.
Basic decency? Human rights?
That is a fundamentally different issue than whether court oversight or warrants are required for foreign intelligence collection outside of the United States. Neither is, in fact, require
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That's like getting a guard dog and not posting a "beware of dog" sign or like getting a nuclear arsenal and keeping it a secret until you are attacked, or getting a red Ferrari and not using it to pick up hot chicks... Idiotic, in other words!
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I willing to play devil's advocate and say that it is a bad thing. Or, at least, the presumption that everything associated with the U.S. government should be kept secret from her citizens. In a democracy, everything paid for by taxpayer dollars should be open unless there is a real national security reason that it should be kept secret. And, I'm not convinced that there was a national security reason for Google to take down those images; it was probably some "cover my ass" action.
Really. First off, the US is not a democracy, it's a republic. Semantics I guess. I don't think there's a real good argument out there for a need for there to be "street view" images of a United States military installation. Do you? Do you not see how that could be bad? That would put the level of your stupidity right up there with the guy who approved it in the first place I guess, so you're not alone?
DaveSchroeder and I finally agree on something (Score:2)
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As for the people who let them on the installation, I'm guessing they weren't military. There's a lot of "rent-a-cops" "protecting" military bases right now.
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Go to wikipedia and look up OPSEC. Not that I necessarily agree with it, but use your imagination, man.
Do we think there should be street level maps inside military installations on Google Street View?
The military asked to have them removed. Obviously not.
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Reply -> How or why this is a bad thing?
"this" = Google pulling the images
Make more sense now?
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Re:I'm trying to discover... (Score:5, Insightful)
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could've been great opportunity for misinformation (Score:3, Funny)
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I'm trying to discover...
...how or why this is a bad thing.
You know - I don't think anyone actually said it WAS a bad thing. It's interesting. It touches on something we know; interesting tech that tends to draw a lot of debate. That makes it news. But I'm not seeing anything that says there's something to be upset about.
I suppose it's the nature of these things. Slashdot covers so many negative things that its gotten to the point one almost expects it. It almost goes against conditioning to see and article as anything but interesting.
Unless, of course, yo
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But any good security model employs security in depth, including elements from security by design and security through obscurity [schneier.com]. In fact, it's foolish to not do both.
I'm sorry, but the justification that anyone can get onto some ungated bases and drive/walk around is absolutely no excuse for Google Street View coverage of US military installations.
they let them in... (Score:5, Interesting)
google street view camera [gizmodo.com]
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Re:they let them in... (Score:5, Interesting)
So that's it - You want to sneak onto base, arm yourself with flowers.
(As a side note, on my first breach - a missile range - I was armed with a rat. But that's another story...)
Flowers beat military force! (Score:4, Funny)
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I need some material for a d&d campaign, perhaps it'll give me inspiration
Re:they let them in... (Score:5, Interesting)
Basically, I got lost. Really lost. (I've been known to get lost in elevators - Really. That can be embarrassing to explain.) I was driving from El Paso to Las Cruces with all of my stuff in my car because I was moving to go to school. That included my pet rat who would ride either in his cage on my passenger seat or on my shoulder. Anyway, I somehow wound up on the wrong side of the Organ mountains (I should have noticed that I'd lost the highway when I realized that there was no traffic and that somebody had installed tank-crossing signs along the road.) The road dead-ended at a guard station - I didn't realize that until the last minute because it was after midnight (dark) and I was tired. The guards (3) came out as I was scrambling to get my rat back in his cage. Before the guard that approached my car could ask WTF I was doing there, I started with "Where the hell am I?" With that, the other two guards chuckled and went back in the building.
The guard that remained was obviously more interested in my rat than he was me and asked a few questions as to why in the hell I would have a rat with me. (Wouldn't a better question be "Why are you driving up to a military guard post at 0030?) I explained that I was moving had gotten turned around. He warned me that the missile range was closed except to personnel working there and told me to drive straight through without deviating. I did.
That's it - End of story. It disturbed me a little that I was let in, but turning me around would have taken 1 hour+, so I won't complain.
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But it seems to me that you were authorized.
Fair enough. Maybe I should have said "improperly authorized" rather than "unauthorized".
In both cases, guards overstepped their authority by waving me on. The guards (for good reason) are not in charge of setting the security policies, just enforcing them. Now, is a guard exercising his own personal judgment and bending the rules a little to cut a break for someone that they decide isn't a threat necessarily a dangerous security breach? Probably not. But, in any case, the potential consequences are o
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Seriously. There's no way that story can be a bad one
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They were hidden in the frickin' sharks
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really? (Score:5, Interesting)
Google Street View: Hey, we want to update Google Maps so ordinary citizens can more easily find their way around cities. Can we go into your military base with this car mounted with cameras in every direction? Seeing as so many ordinary citizens are going to and from the Starbucks next to Colonel Hapablap's quarters. Even though it's against Google policy to do this in military bases.
Military Base: I see no problem with that.
Seriously, how did this happen in the first place? Doesn't the military have security?
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Picture this. You're a gate guard at on a military base. Your instructions are to allow people in with the proper credentials, deny those without, salute officers and be on the lookout for questionable activity. You do this 10-12 hours a day and get absolutely no respect. You see an odd looking contraption in a car that, through the mind-numbing tedium of your job, you may point out to the guy you're working with, but p
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but they don't listen to you because their job is 100% useless 99.9% of the time, and identifying the remaining .1% of the time is trivial.
This is so dead on from my experience being in the Air Force back on the early 80's at least. Reminds me of the time we jacked the security guys at gunpoint when they crossed our barrier on the flight line with live weapons on the aircraft. You need to remember that at least what I saw in the Air Force, those that washed out of their chosen career due to not being able to complete the training became cops.
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They did in the early 1970s when I was in the Air Force. My normal job at Dover was towing Aerospace Ground Equipment (AGE; compressors, generators, air conditioners, etc) around the flight line. Note that Dover was a MAC base, it's where the dead soldiers were flown from Vietnam to. I didn't know that until long after I was discharged and had no idea that those alumanum boxes were full of corpses.
I was once volunteered to do a "security detal". The SPs (Same as MPs only t
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You're kidding, right? Look at other types of outright incompetence or mismanagement, not only in the military, but in the private sector. Time and again, screwing up is rewarded with golden parachutes and promotions. Here are just a few examples:
Carly Fiorina, former head of Hewlett Packard. Drove the company into the ground with its purchase of Compaq. Mismanagement led to severe decline in HP quality. Left HP with a
Fort Sam Houston, in Texas (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Fort Sam Houston, in Texas (Score:5, Informative)
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They just uploaded, recently, San Antonio street-level pics (like, over the last couple weeks), so it makes sense, just due to timing.
And while Sam might be open, it's still generally not kosher to be taking pictures of everything.
Hollywood politics (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Hollywood politics (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Hollywood politics (Score:5, Insightful)
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ITS NOT CENSORSHIP (Score:4, Interesting)
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Re:ITS NOT CENSORSHIP (Score:4, Insightful)
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let me get this straight (Score:5, Insightful)
Are citizens less equal? (Score:5, Insightful)
I consider it a threat that anyone can scout my home for robbery (ie. the best approach and exit) without even driving by.
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I'll say it again though, someone driving by your house isn't the same as them being able to "scope" you out from the internet. It
Re:Are citizens less equal? (Score:5, Insightful)
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Having lived on a military base... (Score:3, Funny)
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A lot of the pizza drivers are active duty or retired mil. They take the runs on base specifically to avoid any hassles.
I was one of those.
Just pushing their luck. (Score:5, Insightful)
It sounds to me that the guys that were filming just wanted a challenge, see how far they can get waving a "google-film-crew" badge. Or just try for giggles, who knows.
Anyway, it seems to me the military is the erroneous party involved here, if you just let a citizen drive up your base and let them film, something is definatly wrong with your security
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Google Intelligence Service (Score:3, Funny)
Oblig Google Map Video (Score:2)
Google compromising mission statement (Score:3, Insightful)
Maybe they should have started at a different base (Score:3, Funny)
Perhaps it wasn't the best choice to start off at Area-51. That place doesn't exist after all....
I guess (Score:2, Interesting)
I'm the only who thought about, why not change the pictures of the base, to be wholly incorrect, or swap them around. In this way, your average civilian Joe can enjoy zooming around the military base at home, and your average terrorist Bob cannot effectively plan an assault.
Just a thought..
The Most Important Question (Score:2)
Re:Google Haters (Score:5, Funny)
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Out of curiosity I looked at Google Maps, and although the bombers are gone, I saw SR71s and U2s still there.
But I wonder, are the planes I saw at Google Maps real, or were they fakes/decoys? Or were the Google photos themselves fake, with the B-5s photoshopped out? Hmmm, I should check Google Maps f
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View Larger Map [google.com]
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-nB (and AF private subcon Brat)
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Dover AFB has always been C-5 focused. The C141s have been/are being put out to pasture, replaced by C17s.
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I'm not goint to say what base or where it was, but in the early 1970s I was on a base with thousands of B52s loaded with nuclear warheads waiting for WWIII/Armageddon. There were several SR-71s and U2s as well.
There were a total of 744 B-52s produced. Far shot from 'thousands'. The only ones that were on the runways loaded were the alert line, far fewer than were stationed at any bases.
On top of that, SR-71s and B-52s were never stationed at the same bases. The only base the SR-71 ever operated out of that was non-CONUS was Kadena, Okinawa. I'm calling BS on your being on any base in the early 70s that had all three aircraft.
Although if you look up any operational base, you can clearly see the alert lines wi
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Wouldn't have been very smart of them to be truthful about how many spy planes and bomers they'd built.
I'm not sure if the U2s were natively stationed there, but I beleive they were as they were there quite a lot.
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Allowing them to scout the territory before they make thier attempt will make it all the easier for them to target either large numbers of poeple or important people.
Look at the Oklahoma City bombing, two guys with a crapload of fertilizer and a uHual. How exactly are the gaurds soposed to stop a truck that rams it's way through the gates, drives up to the commanders mes
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Yeah, would suck for the security guy though.
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So what? My street can be scouted by terrorists and there are no armed military guards stationed there to defend it. If it's good enough for my street, why shouldn't it be good enough for a US military installation?
Look at the Oklahoma City bombing, two guys with a crapload of fertilizer and a uHual. How exactly are the gaurds soposed to stop
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However, the US military operates in a democracy, not a military dictatorship. The people have a right to know what the military is doing, how they are treating their recruits, how they behave in battle. And that necessitates disclosure, not secrecy.
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