Google Street View comes to UK

Google's Street View mapping service, which provides 360-degree panoramic street-level photos, has launched in the UK. >> Google Street View: our first look Street-level imagery of 25 UK cities, including Belfast, Edinburgh, Leeds and London is now available in Google Earth and Google Maps for Mobile. According to Google, millions of images have been captured for Street View in the UK, covering 22,369 miles of road. Web User's home at the IPC Blue Fin Building
View Larger Map In areas where Street View is available, you can access street-level imagery by zooming into the lowest level on Google Maps, or by dragging the orange icon on the left-hand side of the map onto a blue highlighted street. >> Best Google Earth extras and add-ons. Google's geospatial technologist Ed Parsons said: "Street View has been hugely popular with our users in Europe and worldwide and we're thrilled it's now available in the UK for so many great cities, enabling users to see street-level panoramas of major city roads and look up and print out useful driving directions." >> Google Street View: top tips for using the service Earlier this year, a US couple, who accused Google of violating their privacy because the Street View feature showed a picture of their house, lost a legal battle against the search giant. Google insists it has "gone to great lengths to safeguard privacy" by only containing imagery that is already visible from public roads and features technology that blurs both faces and licence plates. At the press launch in London on Thursday, Google said people can flag images that they find inappropriate by clicking on the 'Report a concern' link in Street View. A dedicated Google team will follow up concerns and if these images are deleted or blackened-out, they will remain so in future updates. >> Where's Wally in Google Street View Google also launched Street View in the Netherlands today bringing the number of countries where the service is now available to nine. http://maps.google.co.uk