Google Maps Unfit for High-End Applications: Surveyor General

Soon Survey of India maps will be made public for anyone to use.

(Photo: Google maps screenshot)

India's mapping and survey organisation Survey of India (SoI) on Thursday said Google Maps is "not authenticated" and "un-approved" by the government, and hence not fit for high-end applications.

Surveyor General of India Swarna Subba Rao said Google Maps is used by low-end applications with a confined accuracy, while the Survey of India maps are used for high-engineering applications.

"If you talk about the authentication, Google Maps is not authenticated. It hasn't been produced by the government, so they aren't authenticated," Rao said at a programme on the occasion of 250th anniversary of the Survey of India.

Rao also said, “If you are using Google Maps to reach a restaurant or park, even if you reach 50 meters close to that place, you are happy. But when we have to construct a new railway line or canals, our topographic maps come in handy. They are used when one requires very accurate, engineering quality data."

A senior Survey of India official said the government did not have control over the information that applications like Google Maps or Google Earth, put out in the public domain.

There should be some controls, but the fact is that government doesn’t have any restrictions or control over the applications like Google Earth or Google Maps.

A senior Survey of India official told IANS.

Google Earth was earlier embroiled in controversy after reportedly being used by terrorists and displaying pictures of certain high-security and sensitive establishments like White House.

SoI has recently taken initiative to make its maps and surveys accessible to the Indian citizens free of cost.

"The maps are still being uploaded and there are some glitches with the website which are being fixed," the official said.