14 DAY TRIAL // Google Earth was installed on more than 200 million computers, being one of the most popular applications on the Internet. It seems like the Google downloadable program managed to attract more people than the population of Brazil (188 million) and almost the population of the US that currently has 301 residents. The comparison was made by CNET News that also sustained that Google's application is even more popular than Windows XP, being installed on more computers than the famous operating system.
Even the US President George W. Bush talked about the Google application saying that "I kind of like to look at the ranch on Google, reminds me of where I want to be sometimes."
Although Google Earth is a very popular application, the search giant's program created a lot of problems for the parent company because it showed private imagery with numerous locations of the world. Although this kind of trouble is quickly resolved by the replacement with older pictures, Google Earth was involved even in terrorists attacks and not only once. For example, it was first reported that terrorists were using Google Earth to attack the UK troops located in Basra. At that time, the Mountain View company replaced the detailed imagery with older one, captured before the departure of the army in the area.
Recently, it was reported that the terrorist were also using the downloadable application to organize the attack from the JFK International Airport. Although the attempts were stopped before they happened, it was another obvious sign that Google Earth shows some things that must be hidden from the public eyes.
Last week, the search giant debuted Street View, a new function of Google Maps that caused even more controversy over the privacy infringement done by the solution. The Street View function offers street level panoramas with several US cities.