The controversial Google Street View project has arrived in Australia taking snaps in our major cities and towns.

The project has already captured images at street level in 17 US cities and attached them to the highly popular Google Maps online application.

It was launched in the US in May, and quickly attracted controversy after claims several images breached privacy.

Some images identified men outside strip clubs, women sunbaking in parks and even captured a woman’s g-string as she emerged from her car. Soon after, Google modified several images to remove or mask the identity of individuals.

Google Australia’s head of corporate communications Rob Shilkin said Australia’s privacy laws were tighter than those in the United States, and that no one’s privacy would be compromised.

“We’re giving very considerable thought to how best to safeguard Australian’s privacy, including consulting experts and community groups, while enabling all Australians to benefit from this new feature,” Mr Shilkin said.

“We’re focusing on finding ways to ensure that individuals’ faces are not identifiable in pictures taken in Australia and that licence plate numbers are not identifiable in Australia.”

Cameras mounted on top of “Google-labelled” cars will travel around Australian cities and towns, pausing to take a 360-degree photo, record the location of the image using GPS, and then move to the next location.

The images will be collected throughout summer and are likely to appear online in the second half of next year. (via news.com.au)