Google complies with S. Korea's security requirements for high-precision map data: gov't

Seoul, Nov. 13 (Yonhap) - The South Korean government announced on Friday that Google has adhered to strict security requirements as a condition for transferring high-precision map data abroad. The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport revealed that a government-led advisory board examined Google's implementation of security protocols after the company's conditional approval in February to export 1:5,000-scale digital maps.

According to the review, Google had successfully implemented measures to safeguard geographic coordinates and sensitive military facilities on its Google Maps and Google Earth services, including web and mobile platforms. To comply with the regulations, Google developed a specialized control system specifically for South Korea and put safeguards in place to halt app updates if they could potentially expose restricted geographic coordinates.

Earlier this year, Google signed a deal to obtain security-processed satellite imagery from the National Geographic Information Institute (NGII) via a local partner. As part of the agreement, Google must promptly replace existing images on its map services with the security-processed ones, without making any alterations.