Google to hand over intercepted data

Google will begin handing over to European regulators the rogue data it intercepted from private WiFi Internet connections within the next two days, in an effort to defuse growing controversy over its latest privacy blunder.

Eric Schmidt, chief executive, said the world's largest Internet company would hand over information initially to the German, French and Spanish data protection authorities. Germany is considering a criminal investigation into the practice. Google faced a stand-off with Hamburg privacy authorities last week over whether it would be legal to hand over the rogue data. It now appears willing to reach a compromise. The company will also publish the results of an external audit into the practice, in which cars photographing streets for Google's Street View service ended up also collecting snippets of personal information from unsecured WiFi networks.