The NYPD has sent a cease and desist letter to Google, demanding that it remove alerts about DWI checkpoints on the Waze driving app.
Google purchased the popular crowd-sourced app in 2013.
“This letter serves to put you on notice that the NYPD has become aware that the Waze Mobile application, a community-driven GPS navigation application owned by Google LLC, currently permits the public to report DWI checkpoints throughout New York City and map these locations on the application,” the NYPD wrote.
“Individuals who post the locations of DWI checkpoints may be engaging in criminal conduct since such actions could be intentional attempts to prevent and/or impair the administration of the DWI laws and other relevant criminal and traffic laws,” the letter continued. “The posting of such information for public consumption is irresponsible since it only serves to aid impaired and intoxicated drivers to evade checkpoints and encourage reckless driving. Revealing the location of checkpoints puts those drivers, their passengers, and the general public at risk.”
The letter comes after Google launched a new feature on its Google Maps app, alerting drivers to the location of police speed cameras.
According to Streetsblog NYC, Google is now offering some of the Waze alerts, like speed cameras, on Google Maps.
(AP)
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8 Responses
Speaking of criminals?
Maybe the nypd should look in the mirror.
They are the king of coverups!
Good luck trying to suppress free speech.
I don’t understand. This is clear corruption. If the drivers know the cameras are there THEY WON’T SPEED! Isn’t that the goal???? If they don’t know they’re there they will speed! Isn’t the purpose of the cameras to have safer roads with less speeding?????
This is sick because the alternative is that they don’t care about safety and all they want is our money. Yimach shemam of these disgusting people. They’d rather less safe roads and take our money.
Google is on thin (legal) ice….there are court decisions in multiple states dismissing drivers who were arrested for various actions (holding signs by the side of the road, flashing headlights, etc. ) to alert other drivers to radar traps. The Waze type alerts are really an electronic form of “alert’ and protected speech. What Google is doing may be bad corporate citizenship but certainly not illegal.
If someone is sober enough to pay attention to the app alerts, then maybe he is safe to drive….😂
ocho sinco, you are on the money (pun intended)
Just a thought… More people reporting things on waze while they’re driving is technically also pretty stupid, unless of course it’s the passenger using the phone. Aside from this issue.. It’s all about the police trying to make more money. It’s kind of like parking meters. They wouldn’t want people to stop parking illegally, because then they stop making money. It’s like a rosh yeshiva putting a knas on untucked shirts but wanting kids to untuck their shirts so that he can fund the yeshiva with that money.
But what if a known murderer is on the loose and cops are looking for his car and when the criminal sees the warning he does a u turn to avoid the cops and then goes to kill your child. Would you still agree that it is free speech? If everyone would just obey the traffic law you wouldn’t need a warning. And if the cops are there to catch the criminals isn’t it a service to us?