Introduction
Google Street View was created by sending camera-equipped vehicles through streets
and neighborhoods to capture 360-degree images that could later be viewed through Google
Maps. As Vaidhyanathan (2011) explains, Google generally used a “publish first, respond later”
approach. Images were made publicly available, and people who found their homes, vehicles,
faces, or personal activities exposed had to request that Google blur or remove them. Although
Google automatically blurred many faces and license plates, the system was imperfect, and
individuals could still be recognized through their clothing, surroundings, property, pets, or other
identifying details. The service also created different privacy concerns across cultures.
In Japan, for example, residents viewed narrow residential streets and spaces behind
fences as extensions of private life, while Google initially treated them as ordinary public spaces.
Similar objections appeared in Germany, Greece, Canada, and the United Kingdom, where
residents questioned Google’s notification practices, data collection, and removal process.
Google Street View is mostly unavailable in Saudi Arabia due to privacy concerns and security
restrictions. Vaidhyanathan also notes that people with limited technological knowledge were
less able to discover and challenge unwanted images, placing them at a greater disadvantage
(Vaidhyanathan, 2011). In this Case Analysis, I will argue that Confucianism, supported by
Floridi’s and Grimmelmann’s approaches to privacy, shows that Google should have
implemented Street View through privacy protection from the beginning, clear notice before
neighborhoods were photographed, community consultation, and policies adapted to local
cultural expectations.

Floridi’s Analysis of Privacy
The first concept from Floridi’s work is his explanation of informational friction.
Informational friction means the obstacles that make information difficult to collect, access, or
spread. Before Street View, someone generally had to physically visit a neighborhood to
examine its houses and residents. Google dramatically lowered that friction by making detailed
street images instantly available to users worldwide. This transformed what was once temporary
and locally observed information into something searchable, repeatable, and easily distributed.
Although Street View can be used for legitimate purposes, it also allows strangers to examine
people’s homes and surroundings out of idle curiosity or momentary hostility. Reasonable
informational friction is therefore necessary because it prevents personal information from
becoming universally accessible without consent or a legitimate purpose (Floridi, 2014).
Floridi’s second important concept is the self-constituting value of privacy. According to
Floridi, personal information is not simply property that belongs to an individual; it forms part of
that individual’s identity. Therefore, collecting or publishing personal information without
consent can be understood as an intrusion against the person rather than an intrusion against
something they own (Floridi, 2014). This idea applies to Street View because photographs of
homes, vehicles, clothing, and even pets can reveal important details about residents, even when
their faces and license plates are blurred. These images may cause strangers to make assumptions
about a person’s lifestyle, relationships, wealth, or behavior. Google’s decision to publish these
details before receiving consent allowed the company and its users to influence how individuals
were represented to the public. From Floridi’s perspective, privacy-first settings would have
protected people’s ability to shape and maintain their own identities rather than forcing them to
discover and correct unwanted representations afterward.
Additionally, Floridi (2014) also explained how digital technologies do not have to
reduce privacy. Older technologies primarily lowered informational friction; newer technologies
have the ability to either decrease or increase it depending on how they are designed. By blurring
and removing certain aspects of Street View, Google demonstrates that it has the power to
implement stronger privacy protections. However, Google only applied many of those
protections after images had already been published or after someone submitted a complaint.
This placed the responsibility on residents to discover that their information had been exposed
and then take action.
A more ethical design would have increased informational friction before publication by
automatically blurring people, license plates, homes, and private residential spaces. Google could
also have notified communities before photographing them and provided a simple method for
residents to request exclusion before the images became publicly available. These protections
would not have eliminated Street View’s usefulness, but they would have prevented unrestricted
access to information that people never knowingly chose to share.
Confucianism strengthens these criticisms because it evaluates conduct through
relationships, responsibilities, and the proper fulfillment of social roles. Since Google possessed
greater technological knowledge and power than the residents being photographed, it also held a
greater responsibility to protect those residents from unwanted exposure. Yes, with great power
does come great responsibility. Confucianism is the belief that living morally depends on
remaining on the proper path, or dao, and fulfilling one’s relational roles rather than judging
isolated actions alone. A Confucian approach would require Google to act with care, respect, and
restraint rather than placing convenience and expansion above its relationships with those
communities. Privacy protections from the beginning would therefore have represented a better
fulfillment of Google’s responsibilities as a powerful technology provider.

Grimmelmann’s Analysis of Privacy
The first central point that can be extracted from Grimmelmann’s work is the privacy
paradox. The privacy paradox is the idea that people say they value privacy, yet they continue
using services and making choices that expose personal information (Grimmelmann, 2010).
Grimmelmann is not trying to say that people are incapable of making choices consistent with
their stated beliefs or that they do not care about privacy at all. Grimmelmann argues that this is
largely a structural problem rather than proof that users do not value privacy. Websites, mostly
social media websites, can make privacy controls confusing, encourage immediate sharing, and
hide the possible consequences of exposure.
However, I want to note an important point: Although users are not literally forced to
access the most popular websites simply because others use them, Grimmelmann argues that
social opportunities, relationships, and network effects can make opting out difficult or costly,
especially after users have invested time and built connections on a platform. This concern
applies even more strongly to Street View because the affected residents were not users who
chose to disclose their information. Many were included simply because they lived in a
photographed neighborhood or happened to be within the camera’s view. Their failure to submit
a complaint should not be interpreted as consent or indifference toward privacy.
The second, and arguably the main central point from Grimmelmann’s work, would be
privacy as product safety. Grimmelmann compares privacy-harming software to an unsafe
physical product. A hammer can injure someone, but manufacturers should still avoid making it
unnecessarily dangerous. Likewise, digital services may provide benefits while still containing
preventable privacy risks (Grimmelmann, 2010). One important lesson from product-safety law
is that a company can still bear responsibility even when the consumer also makes a mistake.
Applied to Street View, residents should not carry the entire burden simply because they failed to
request that an image be removed. Many people may not have known that their homes or
activities had been photographed, and others may not have understood how to challenge the
publication. Google was in a better position to anticipate these problems before releasing the
images.
Furthermore, Grimmelmann argues that disclaimers are not a substitute for a safe
product. Similarly, informing users that they may request blurring after publication does not
excuse an unnecessarily risky design. By the time a resident discovers the image, it may already
have been viewed, copied, or distributed. A removal policy addresses the harm only after
exposure has occurred, rather than preventing it. Sellers may be responsible for design defects
that affect the entire product, not merely isolated errors (Grimmelmann, 2010). Street View’s
privacy problem was not limited to a few malfunctioning cameras or missed faces. The broader
problem was Google’s decision to publish first and require residents to object afterward. A
reasonable alternative design could have used broader automatic blurring, provided notice before
photographing neighborhoods, used lower camera positions near residential property, and
applied local privacy standards before images became publicly searchable. Grimmelmann’s
product-safety model therefore suggests that Street View was unethical not because it had risks,
but because Google did not reduce completely avoidable risks.
From a Confucian perspective, and this must be reiterated, Google had the power to make
the necessary changes to benefit the people and respect their privacy. Instead, its protections
were largely reactive and insufficient. Google had the ability to design the service in a way that
encouraged privacy from the beginning, yet it placed the burden on residents to discover
unwanted images and submit complaints after the exposure had already occurred. A more
responsible approach would have been for Google to predict possible pitfalls within its system,
create safer defaults, warn communities, and add stronger protections before publication rather
than relying on residents to correct the problem afterward.

Conclusion
Google Street View could have been implemented more ethically by protecting privacy
before publishing images rather than fixing problems afterward. Floridi’s ideas show that Street
View reduced informational friction and made personal details easier to access, while
Grimmelmann’s product-safety approach shows that Google had a responsibility to reduce
foreseeable privacy risks through better design. From a Confucian perspective, Google’s greater
power and knowledge also gave it a greater responsibility to respect the communities affected by
the service.
One possible concern is that stronger privacy protections could have made Street View
less useful or more difficult to operate. However, privacy and usefulness are not mutually
exclusive. Automatic blurring, notifications given to the communities in advance, favorable
camera positions, and easier removal options could have reduced harm without destroying the
service’s value. Google could not prevent every privacy problem, but it could have created a
more respectful balance between innovation and the people being photographed.

References
Floridi, L. (2014). The Fourth Revolution: How the Infosphere is Reshaping Human Reality.
Oxford University Press.
Grimmelmann, J. (2010). Privacy as product safety. Widener Law Journal, 19(3), 793–828.
Vaidhyanathan, S. (2011). The Googlization of Everything: (And why we should worry).
University of California Press.