Google official: Google Earth cannot count number of protesters

his month, Google executives denied figures concerning Egypt’s 30 June protests against ousted President Mohamed Morsy that supposedly came from them, claiming statistics attributed to the web giant were ‘false.’ Google Earth images are not live or real-time, they are built from a broad range of imagery providers and generally publish images that are commercially available to anyone who wants to buy them. The resolution of the imagery we use does not typically permit the identification of individuals.

[blockquote style=”quote” align=”left” author=”Maha Abouelenein, Head of Communications of Google MENA”]Google Earth does not measure the number of protesters in Egypt or anywhere else.[/blockquote] All statistics attributed to us regarding the number of protesters during the 30 June demonstrations or others staged by supporters of deposed President Mohamed Morsy are untrue, said Wael El-Fakharani, director of Google MENA.

The company instead claimed it had not issued any statistics regarding the number of protesters on the streets in Egypt. Google has no ability to count the number of protesters on the ground, Fakharani stressed, denying claims it was possible to calculate a size of a crowd through Google Earth, an online map app.

Opponents of Morsy previously claimed Google figures had counted 30 million demonstrators on the streets on the 30 June mass protests. While Ex President Morsy supporters claimed they numbered 34 million, again citing Google figures.