Following his support for the controversial anti-piracy legislation proposed by SOPA and PIPA, Senator Chuck Schumer is now tackling another internet behemoth and aiming to alter the new 3D mapping technologies of Google and Apple.
Schumer issued a statement to Google CEO Larry Page and Apple chief Tim Cook, hoping to protect New Yorkers from what he deems as an invasion of privacy from their "military-grade spy plane" produced images. He writes:
Barbequing or sunbathing in your backyard shouldn’t be a public event. People should be free from the worry of some high-tech peeping Tom technology violating one’s privacy when in your own home...Apple and Google will have access to private and sensitive images. It’s imperative that these companies disclose their plans for protecting privacy of both individuals and sensitive infrastructure, their publication intentions, and their plans for including public consent in the mapping process.
He follows up with three proposed changes for both companies to adopt:
- Provide notification to communities as to when you plan to conduct mapping
- Automatically blur photos of individuals who are captured, and give property owners the right to opt-out of having the company map their homes
- Put protocols in place with law enforcement and local municipalities to ensure that sensitive infrastructure details are blurred from published maps
The statement coincides with Apple's official debut of their own mapping app, consequently dropping Google Maps from their future products.
Schumer is known for his denunciations of various products ranging from bath salts (the same amphetamine combo blamed for the horrific Miami zombie incident) to those crazy inhalable caffeine shots. The senator is also largely credited with ending the sale of Four Loko in New York.
On a more tech-related note, Schumer also condemned Facebook's Eduardo Saverin's decision to renounce his US citizenship, a move widely speculated as a strategy to avoid paying American taxes in light of Facebook's recent IPO.
He did however defend Saverin after denouncers compared the Facebook co-founder to a Nazi. Watch below for more: