How to blur your house on Google Street View (and why you should)

Privacy Please explores the ways in which privacy is violated in the modern world and what can be done about it.

Street View gives a glimpse into the world in all its weird, intimate, and often raw glory. That window also looks into your home. Think views into bedroom windows, potential fodder for stalkers, and more.

There is something you can do about it. If you want to blur your house out, you can ask for a smeared suggestion of a building in its place. The process is very easy.

Street View provides a street-level view of many cities and towns around the world. The service has been controversial from the start, both in the ways you might imagine and the ways you might not.

In 2008, the Minnesota suburb of North Oaks decided it didn't want pictures of it up on the internet, and threatened to cite the internet company for being in the area. The images were pulled down.

Privacy International filed a complaint with the Information Commissioner of the United Kingdom (ICO) in 2009, accusing Google of failing to properly de-identify the people it captured. That type of failure could have serious repercussions according to a report at the time.

A woman who had moved house to escape a violent partner but who was recognisable outside her new home on Street View was one of the people who complained to Privacy International.

Staying cool in Brooklyn. Credit: Screenshot / street view

That is just the obvious stuff.

It has never been a steward of anyones privacy. In 2010, the company admitted that its Street View vehicles had secretly been collecting information from the unencrypted networks they drove past for years.

Maybe you don't want strangers looking in your windows, maybe you don't want strangers looking in your home, or maybe you just don't want your home to be made public. It is relatively easy to request a blur out of the image of your home or apartment on Street View.

Here is what you do.

1. Go to Google Maps and enter your home address

2. Enter into Street View mode by dragging the small yellow human-shaped icon, found in the bottom-right corner of the screen, onto the map in front of your house

3. With your house in view, click "Report a problem" in the bottom-right corner of the screen

4. Center the red box on your home, and select "My home" in the "Request blurring" field

Google's San Francisco office. Credit: screenshot / google

5. Write in the provided field why you want the image blurred (for example, you may be concerned about safety issues)

6. Enter in your email address, and click "Submit"

It is important to be sure that it is what you want. It is permanent if you have blurred your house on Street View.

You live in the place. If you ever need to be reminded of what it looks like, you can go outside and see for yourself.

After you submit your request, you should receive an email from the company stating that it is reviewing the image and will email you when it is resolved. You will need to do the entire process again if you want the picture to be blurry.

That is it.

Now is the time to enable 7 Google privacy settings.

It is not clear how long it takes to process the requests, so you should get started now. It is not like Microsoft should get any special treatment when you do the same thing on Bing Maps.