Toronto (ECN) - As of Wednesday, residents in several Canadian cities--including Toronto--can check out their streets, homes and neighbourhoods on Google Street View.
The Google Maps feature was rolled out Wednesday displaying images on the Internet from a street-level perspective. The CN Tower, Rogers Centre, and Queen
The service is also available in Calgary, Montreal, Quebec City, Halifax, Vancouver, Squamish, B.C., Whistler, B.C., Ottawa, Kitchener and Waterloo.
Once on a Google map, the user clicks and drags the image of a small yellow figure on a left-side scale and places it on the map.
A photo of the street, including a 360-degree view, then appears.
Of course now that the new service is live, Canadians are scrambling to find unique and funny images.
One photo (shown above), shows Calgary Stampeder Cheerleaders ouse the stadium.
Concern Over Privacy Issues
With the launch of Google Street View in the US in 2007, there has been a significant amount of concern of privacy issues. People complained that that photos were taken of inside their homes and on private streets.
In the first days of launch the UK service drew criticism due to privacy. Images were found of a man leaving a sex shop, a man vomiting and another man being arrested. Google agreed to remove some of the images in question.
The service drew criticism in Belfast that it represented a "reckless" security risk, particularly for showing the exteriors of army bases and police stations so soon after the killing of two soldiers in the 2009 Massereene Barracks shooting, and a police officer.
In response, Google agreed to blur images of peoples faces and license place. Last April, the Privacy Commissioner of Canada, Jennifer Stoddart asked Google to warn people when the Google Car was going to be taking images of their streets. Google refused to comply only saying when they will be in a certain area.
Google Street View is available in 14 countries.
