Google has admitted its face blurring may have been “a little overzealous” after pixelating a cow’s face in Street View.
We are all used to human faces and number plates being obscured, in order to protect individual’s privacy, but it seems the tech giant has beefed-up its privacy policy even further in recent weeks.
The Guardians’ US opinion editor David Shairatmadari was using the tool when he spotted the blurred out cow, grazing on the River Cam in Cambridge, and uploaded a screenshot to Twitter.
He commented: “Great to see Google takes cow privacy seriously.”
Google responded to the tweet, which has now been retweeted more than 10,000 times, telling the BBC: “We thought you were pulling the udder one when we herd the moos, but it’s clear that our automatic face-blurring technology has been a little overzealous.
“Of course, we don’t begrudge this cow milking its five minutes of fame.”
Of course commenters have been quick to milk the situation for all it’s worth.