Google's Korea Office Raided

Police raided Google Inc.’s South Korean offices Tuesday to probe potential violations of the country’s telecommunication-privacy law, in the latest move by authorities around the world to ratchet up scrutiny of the Internet search giant’s privacy practices.

The National Police Agency said it is investigating whether the U.S. company collected and stored private information illegally while it prepared for the South Korean launch of its Street View mapping service, which provides panoramic views of streets for Internet search users.

The agency said Google (GOOG) collected information on unspecified users from Wi-Fi wireless network for about six months until May while sweeping through the streets in special vehicles used to assemble street photos for the service.

“We began the probe after having confirmed that the company seized and kept open data as well as unauthorized private communication data collected by its special data-collecting vehicles,” the police said in a statement. Open data refers to data such as businesses’ street addresses that can be kept and stored legally under Korean law.

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