Google Street View

Looking at the BBC website I came accross an article with the following quotes : -

"Google has always said its service observed UK law and that photos were only taken from public areas...."

Does this mean that all "photographers" should be free to take photos from public places...
The anti-terrorst arguement is a bit lame - could the google live view images not be used by terrorists?

Other quotes :-
"David Evans, the Information Commission's senior data protection practice manager, compared being captured by the service to passers-by filmed on TV news camera."

and most importantly: -
"In the same way, there is no law against anyone taking pictures of people in the street as long as the person using the camera is not harassing people," he said. "

Seems to contradict the action of some police departments!

Don't get me going.....

Big brother and all that....

Hardgravity, my point is that these statements seem to help argue the case for the gerneral photographer being able to take street schene photos without risk of harasment from the police.

Google is quoting its interpretation of the law. Whether it be correct or not, it's not going to help you win an argument with a police officer.

The anti-terrorists laws are so imprecise that they effectively give the police the power to move you on or stop you taking photos if they feel like it.

Then there is the issue of what counts as a public place...

According to the legal guidance I was given when shooting Images of England, a public place is one where there is access to the public. So basically, roads, pathways, church grounds, parks, open spaces, etc.

The test is do you pay an admission fee, and if you do it is likely to be a private area where restrictions could be in place.

There may be some areas that are a bit grey such as privately owned public spaces such as a development company owning part of a town centre, but it's rare for this to be a problem. London has a few I think.

I know what you mean but as is said above, try telling P.C.Plod that, There are more and more reports of innocent photographers being persecuted for looking through a view finder.

These uniformed idiots don't realise that a terrorist isn't that obvious!

Re "public spaces": It's the grey areas I'm worried about. How about the roads and pavements immediately around Canary Wharf, for example?

Precisely.

Canary Wharf seems to potentially be a problem, but I'm not familiar with the situation there.

As a general thought, being discrete and non-confrontational there would seem sensible. For example, don't erect a tripod just to make a statement if you don't need to.

I was also thinking about how we look and that could have an impact on how we are perceived. So smart casual may be better received than hoodie. People make assumptions and the security people are no exception to this.

I think the question is are these roads public or private?, Canary Wharf estate is private property, they may welcome visitors to enter it, maybe take a pictures, but probably reserve themselves right to question photographers and set-up other rules. If the roads mentioned are not private (not part of the estate), the only problem should be the increased police attention, but they still should adhere to the rules for photographing from public areas, isn't it?. I guess if these roads were private there should be a signs telling that photography is not permitted (if they wouldn't like it) right?
Other thing is that police could always use other "powers", anti-terror stuff and effectively stop you from taking pictures if they didn't like you (as iceblinker wrote above) .

Thanks for all your input guys - clearly not a straightforward situation. Leading on from this....

I was in Cardiff last weekend with the u11s rubgy team I manage. Just as we were elaving I decided to take a team photo outside the Welsh Assembly building - no problem with that. However when we reached our next destination I realised that I had left my rucksack with camera and lenses on the pavement next to an electricity substation. Luckily I rang the hostel where we were staying and the chap there very kindly walked up the road and found that it was still there.

The point of this is that the government seem obsessed with security but a "bomb sized" rucksack left on the pavement proped against an electric substation by the Welsh Assembly Government buildings doesn't seem to have been picked up on security CCTV for 45 minutes....seems a bit worrying - although I was very grateful to find that it was still there