GOOGLE SEEKS IMMEDIATE REVIEW of Street View wiretap decision:

Google is demanding a federal judge grant it permission to appeal a decision that approved a federal wiretapping lawsuit over its interception of unencrypted Wi-Fi traffic.

The Mountain View, California, media giant responded late Friday to a Silicon Valley federal judge’s June 29 decision in nearly a dozen combined lawsuits seeking damages from Google for eavesdropping on open, unencrypted Wi-Fi networks from its Street View mapping cars. The vehicles, which rolled through neighborhoods across the country, were equipped with Wi-Fi–sniffing hardware to record the names and MAC addresses of routers to improve Google location-specific services. But the cars also secretly gathered snippets of Americans’ data.

Google claims it is was not a breach of the Wiretap Act to intercept data from unencrypted, or non-password-protected Wi-Fi networks. Google said open Wi-Fi networks are akin to “radio communications” like AM/FM radio, citizens’ band and police and fire bands, and are “readily accessible” to the general public — a position rejected by U.S. District Judge James Ware.

More at the link.